


Red Blood and Blue Bones

by moosetashioedmonocle



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Gen, Multi, brace yourselves this is going to be very long
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-05
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-03-29 05:20:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 43
Words: 64,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3883900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moosetashioedmonocle/pseuds/moosetashioedmonocle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The zombie apocalypse isn't really the place for you, Simmons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The shed

The tool shed is a cold place to sleep in.

It’s not quite as cold as the outside, for sure, but you still wake up with your fingertips numb. If you could take the past few hours back, you would keep yourself in the house. You shouldn’t have wandered out here to look for a new weapon.  
Because now you’re locked in a tool shed. Oh yeah, and there’s a zombie trying to get in.

You aren’t one for reflecting on the past. Your past has been nothing but bad things: bad childhood, miserable adolescence, and now you’re stuck in the literal zombie apocalypse. Alone. Things could not get worse for you, you think, before looking back down at your legs.

Oh yeah. That’s right. They always can.  
Your left leg is fucked. If you found a doctor, you know they would look at it and tell you it needs to come off. It’s no longer bleeding, thank god, but a large chunk of it is missing. You managed to wrap your leg before you bled out, but there was nothing you could do to replace the large chunk or fix the snapped bone. You’re no medical practitioner, you remind yourself, it’s a miracle you even kept yourself alive this long after you foolishly stepped into a bear trap.  
In your defense, there was no fucking way you could’ve seen it. Why a bear trap was even set up in a tool shed is beyond you. You assume the owner set it to kill any zombies that stumbled in.

You’re very tempted to call them Walkers, but zombie fits the bill better.

You had been walking for a while. Three weeks, you think, but your high-tech watch is inside the house you were going to take refuge in, along with your other things-including your food, water, and a really warm winter jacket you wish you had grabbed. If money was still a thing, you’d be placing bets on how fast someone would steal your bag if they found it. As for recovering it, the odds of that look…slim.

What do you have? You have one garden rake sharp enough to kill a zombie with the right kind of swing and strong enough to hold one back should they burst in. You have multiples tools, none of which you can use apart from melee weapons. There is a shotgun in here, but no shells. Various supplies that would be more helpful for building things than fixing you.

You have one pistol. Two bullets. One, you have decided, is yours if anything breaks in. The other is for the first son of a bitch that comes through that door.

In the distance, you hear a scream. Another unlucky soul probably being eaten alive. Better them than you, right? Wrong, probably. You don’t exactly amount to much. You’re a scrawny guy who knows everything there is to know about computers, but in combat you’re pretty worthless. Maybe that’s why the group you were with kicked you out.

You shake your head. You know why they kicked you out. One snarky comment about killing the team leader so you could be in charge, and you’re kicked to the curb. How were you supposed to know the rest of them were family? They looked nothing alike-you think. Just like their names, their faces are forgotten to you. Just as well.

There are gunshots. Wow, those are loud. You hope it’ll draw away the small group of zombies that have gathered outside the tool shed. You wish there was some way to know, other than listening for various undead groans. There are windows, but they are all fogged up. Or just dirty. You can’t tell.

Things just got quiet. There is no sound out there. No undead groans, no shots, nothing. Maybe whoever it was did drive them away from you. Thanks, stranger.  
There is no choice now. If you don’t want to die in this shed, you have to get up and get back into the house. You have to get your shit back. Putting all your weight on a helpful box, you roll until your right leg holds you up at an angle, then push to get straightened out. Standing is awkward and painful. Pistol is in one hand. Rake in the other. You can do this.

You open the door as quietly as you can manage. A short distance forward, and you’re screaming.  
“Fuck!” you yell, not because your leg has given out, but because it has given out and you are floored and there was one zombie left in the backyard. Of course there was one. It turns and starts lumbering towards you. You start frantically pushing yourself along with your one good leg, sliding across the lawn to avoid sudden death. “Fuck!” you yell again when you realize the only place you can go is back to the tool shed. Luckily for you, this son of a bitch doesn’t walk fast at all. You easily push yourself back into the shed and look for a solution to this. Pistol. Two bullets. Garden rake.  
The garden rake is held out towards the door with both hands, and when the zombie turns its ugly head, you swing it up and immediately back down, lodging it in the stupid thing’s head. You were hoping to hit a spot with more leverage, but so long as it holds the zombie back you don’t care.  
Pistol. Two bullets. Where is it? Oh yeah. You set it down to swing the rake. You start patting the area around you with a shaky hand. Where is it?  
The zombie growls. Its arms reach forward, and its jaws snap a few times.  
Where is your fucking pistol?  
The rake wobbles. The few metal bits lodged in its skull are stretching beyond capacity.  
WHERE IS YOUR FUCKING PISTOL?  
The rake snaps. The zombie falls to the floor. You yank your legs back and curl into a ball, pushing yourself into the wall with both feet, tears brimming in your eyes at the shots of pain running up your left leg.  
As the zombie gets up, you find your pistol. You fumble with it, disengage the safety, and when the zombie lunges you yank that trigger as hard as you can. The bullet goes through the zombie’s jaw, popping out from the back of its neck. Please, god, let that be a kill shot.

There is a long moment filled with your heavy breathing. In the distance, you hear someone rummaging through something. Sounds like someone is in the house. Of course.

Before you can reevaluate your plans, the corpse before you starts rising. You can’t help it, you scream.  
Pistol. One shot. It’s supposed to be yours.  
The zombie recalibrates itself, and suddenly your eyes are locked with dead ones. You scream again.  
One shot. You aim for this asshole, preparing for the shot. You won’t waste this shot.  
A bullet is fired. The zombie falls.  
Your trigger has not been pulled.

“You alright?” A lumbering shape hangs in the doorway. You readjust your glasses to look at them. Short, fat, and dark, a figure stands in the doorway. They look concerned.

“I-I’m fine. Thank you.” You manage, lowering your pistol to your side. They smile.

“Names Grif. Dexter Grif. What’s yours?”

“Simmons. Dick Simmons.” You wish you could sound less breathy, but you are wide eyed and coming down from an adrenaline rush. Plus, there are tears going down your face. You’re bloody, bruised, and covered in dirt. So is he. So is everyone.

“Nice to meet you, Simmons.” He says, reaching out with a hand to help you up. You reach for it, grab it, but when he pulls you up you realize you forgot about your leg somehow and you just…fall. You fall right into his arms, awkwardly sputtering out apologies when you straighten back up.

“Jesus, your leg-“ he starts, “that’s…not what I think it is, is it?”

“I-it’s not a bite! It’s not! I swear! I got it caught in a trap, it’s not a bite!” you say in a near panic. Grif says nothing for a long moment, his eyes locked on your leg. You swallow. It echoes through your head.

“Are you with a group?” he asks, looking back up at your face.

“No. I’m alone. Have been for a while.”

“Well, Simmons, how would you like to come join up with mine? We have a doctor, maybe he can do something about your leg.” Grif offers with a pointed head nod to your left side.  
It has certainly been a while since you’ve felt positive emotion. You nearly forgot what relief felt like until right now. The fact you don’t know him doesn’t even bother you, you nod heartily.  
You smile for the first time in months as you hobble out of the tool shed, your weight held up by someone else who smiles. Maybe things won’t be so bad after all.


	2. Introductions and exposition

As the two of you slowly make your way back to where Grif’s group resides, he tells you about them. They are now the operators of the military base. Zombies aren’t actually too much of a problem when you have full-body armor and high-grade weapons. The people gathered there are split into two groups-the red team and the blue team. The different groups go out on different days to look for extra supplies and other survivors. Grif is on red team, and usually has orange armor on. He doesn’t say why he isn’t wearing it now.

Red team is led by the most military man in the group, the man everyone just calls Sarge. He’s mean, strict, and constantly hating on Grif.  
“I don’t know why I’m kept around. The guy absolutely hates my guts.” Grif says with a laugh. You can’t chuckle back, it’s been so long since your last human interaction that you’re certain you don’t remember how to laugh.

There are two other members of the red team: Lopez and Donut. Lopez is a Spanish mechanic who hates everyone, but Sarge won’t let anyone kick him out. He’s very good at fixing things, which is helpful, but he’s constantly talking in a sarcastic and insulting manner-even if he’s never understood. As for Donut, he’s a really nice and really normal guy-until he starts with innuendos. He’s flamboyantly gay, even going so far as to don pink armor-though he insists it’s some “lightish red” color. He’s really not too bad, but when he’s around people tend to start questioning their sexuality.

Then there’s blue team. They are led by a guy named Church, but really take their orders from his girlfriend, Tex. She was also in the military, but isn’t like Sarge about it. There’s a guy named Tucker who’s far too much of a jokester for the shit he’s been through. He came to the base one night with a heavily pregnant woman, intent on stealing medicine for her. Her baby had other plans, and decided it was the perfect time to be born. The woman was underfed and had a lung problem, she didn’t even last long enough to deliver her child. Tucker pulled the kid out himself, like a calf. He’s raised Junior ever since, and despite all the shit he talks, he is very overprotective of his kid. There’s also Caboose. Caboose is not entirely there in the head, but he’s a good guy. He’s exceptionally happy and exceptionally strong. He’s also obsessed with Church. Caboose is constantly trying to win Church’s attentions and affections, and is constantly failing at doing just that.

“They’ve also got my sister on their team.” Grif says randomly, as if it were common knowledge that he had a relative. “She’s pretty cool. She’s a bit airheaded, though. She’s actually the whole reason I was found in the first place, so I guess I should be nicer to her.”

“What’s your story, then?” you prod.

“Well, it’s always been just me and her against the world. When the outbreak hit, the only thing that changed was that the bills didn’t have to be paid anymore. We wandered around, just the two of us. One morning I wake up and find she isn’t there-stuff gone and everything. I went out to find her, ended up corned in an alley with only a pocket knife. That’s when Sarge just burst in, shot them all to shit. She eventually came to the base herself, bringing along a piece of shit medic. His name’s Doc. He’ll probably object to cutting your leg off, him being a pacifist and all-” He talks. You listen. You nod occasionally and hum when you need to. In actuality, you’re starting to phase in and out. Walking is tiring. He goes on for a while, filling you in with more details about the other people at the base than you would learn after years of knowing them.

“What about you, Simmons? What’s your story?” he asks, and when you shake your head to object he stops walking. You stop walking. He adjusts the arm around your waist so he can poke you with an elbow. You sigh in defeat.

“There’s not much to say. I’ve been wandering since the outbreak. No family left to find, no friends to meet up with, just me. I had a group a while back, but things got…complicated.” You say it shortly, and he picks up on your hint and asks no more questions.

“Why did you save me?” you ask after a long and quiet pause. You expect another pause to follow suit, but he just shrugs.

“Figured it wasn’t right to listen to the person I was looting die if I could still do something about it. By the way, you scream like a girl.” He adds, and you appreciate the tease.

“Bet you wish you could take it back, now that you know I’m a dude.”

“If I wanted to let you die, I wouldn’t have carried your ass this far. You’re heavier than you look.” you are tempted to make a jab about his weight, but opt not to offend a new friend.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful, but most people would just consider it a bullet saved.”

“Dude, you are a negative person. I can tell it already.”  
You smile. You laugh. Your lungs hurt from even a short little laugh. As you walk, all you know is that you both like and hate Grif.

You’re oddly okay with that.


	3. Without a leg to stand on

The two of you are both tired as fuck when you get to the base. You’re covered in a cold sweat, and you’re lightheaded. He’s stopped with idle chatting, but every once in a while he will ask if you’re sure you’re okay. You really don’t feel like you are. You could really go for a glass of water and a nap. The first thing you hear when the two of you finally lumber to the military base is angry yelling, and when Grif yells for someone to open the door it directs itself at him.

“Damnit Grif! You should’ve been here two hours ago, what have you been doing?” a gruff voice bellows down. Your first glimpse of who you assume to be Sarge is right out of a movie cliché. He’s poised on top of the base’s wall, silhouetted by the last rays of the day’s sun. You swear you hear trumpets playing in the distance.

“It’s not my fault, I found someone out in the city!”

“Wait-there are still people out there? I thought everyone left months ago-“ finally, a voice that isn’t yelling. Or angry. Cheery, even. You want to assume it’s that pastry-named guy, what was it-Éclair? Fuck, you’re too tired to remember.

“Well, there was at least one idiot left out there. Found him screaming in a tool shed on the east side.” You want to object to Grif’s wording of that story, but then remember that is exactly what happened, so you stay quiet while others exchange sentences. Really, you’re just very tired. You didn't realize how much you were leaning on Grif until right now, where you realize you actually aren't really standing. Has your breathing always been this fast?

“Hey, Simmons, you still okay?” Grif asks in a low voice, and you nod. You’re pretty sure you can’t say anything right now. Have you been able to for the past half hour? You’re so wrapped up in the sudden rush of exhaustion that you barely register the door opening and Grif suddenly slides out of view. The ground rushes up to meet you, but you’re held just above it somehow. The cruel light of day becomes a blinding and blurry presence hanging just out of your vision. Someone says something about fetching someone else, and then-

 

“Good morning, new person!” 

You bolt upright and immediately regret it. It’s warm, but it’s awkwardly humid. Sweat covers parts of your skin, and your hair messily falls on your forehead. The space behind your eyes is burning, you can feel a bruise spiraling around your hip, and your left leg is-

You’re extremely confused for a good moment. It takes a moment, but it registers.

Fuck. It’s gone. You were hoping it could be salvaged, but obviously not. You are now a cripple.

“Mister Doctor, the new guy is up!” the same voice that woke you belongs to the person next to you-he’s a big guy, but the beaming smile comforts you slightly. Who fits that description again?

“Hey, good morning stranger! How are you feeling?” there’s a curtain pulled back from the door and an olive-skinned man walks through. He’s smiling. Why is everyone so darn happy here?

“You’re…the doc, right?” You ask. You were kind of expecting a white coat, but hey, you take what you can get these days. You’re lucky you even had a doctor, you could’ve had your leg taken off by a college student in the storage area of a Wal-mart. You don’t question how specific that example was.

“Yeah, that’s me. Frank Dufresne. Everyone calls me Doc. How are you feeling?” He repeats, a bit more forceful. How do you feel? You don’t want to think on that, you would really rather lay back down and sleep for the next eternity. You move your left leg-what’s left of it-and stifle a chuckle at your shitty-as-fuck pun. It’s not as hard as you’d expect, since you’re barely keeping yourself from screaming in pain at what you can honestly say is the worst sensation you've ever felt. There’s a hand rubbing your back, and you know the muscle-guy is trying to soothe you. Guess that showed externally.

“I’m alive, that’s all that matters, right?” you manage after a moment of internal anguish. The muscle-guy frowns.

“Grif was right, you are a very negative person.” He says, shaking his head and standing up. He salutes doc with the wrong hand and leaves. You can hear heavy thuds as he skips down the hall.

“Who was-“

“That’s Caboose. He really likes meeting new people, and I needed to keep him busy for a while. Church would’ve tried strangling him again if I hadn't.” in the back of your mind, you vaguely remember something Grif said about Caboose idolizing that Church guy.

“Where-“

“You’re in the military base. Don’t worry, this is the safest zone for miles.”

“No, where-“

“The town was called Blood Gulch before the city claimed it as part of their territory. I prefer Valhalla myself-not for any religious purpose, I just used to live in the city.”

“Grif. Where is Grif?”

“Grif? Probably sleeping still. He’s not a morning person. Why? Did you want me to get him?” he points with his thumb to the door, and you shake your head.

“Don’t bother him, I’m sure I’ll see him later. How long was I-“

“You were out for a little under 24 hours. Been phasing in and out for about four.”

“Are you ever-“

“You’ve asked me all this twelve times, Richard.” He looks nearly cross. You stop asking questions, and decide to investigate your leg.

 

“It was too deep. I’m sorry I couldn’t save it. I did have Lopez build you a prosthetic, though. Whenever you’re ready to try it, let me know, we’ll get you back on your feet.” With that, Doc leaves the room.

 

Barely five minutes of humid silence pass before the man you assumed to be Sarge bursts in.

“So, you’re the new fellow Grif rescued?” He asks in a booming voice, standing stiffly at the foot of the bed. You straighten up by reflex, giving him a curt nod. He still looks like a cliché, with salt-and-pepper hair perfectly cut above a square, scarred face. He looks you over with sharp eyes, and then cracks a smile. He reminds you of your father, in a weird way.

“Nice to meet you, Simmons. I’m Sarge. I’m sure Grif told you all about our operations here.”

“He did, sir.”

“Well, finally someone who treats people with proper respect! After we whip you into shape, we might just make a good soldier out of you. At least better than our last one.” Grif wasn’t kidding when he said Sarge takes potshots. Still, he’s very likely to be your new commanding officer-it would do some good to kiss up to him.

“You mean Grif, sir?”

“Damn straight I mean Grif. Whatever romantic notions you have about the man who burst in and rescued you, erase them and replace them with who Grif really is-lazy, rude, disgusting-“ Sarge goes on, setting you straight on who everyone at this base is-unfit, other than Tex and Lopez. Mainly, he complains about Grif. You didn’t have any romantic notions about him anyway, now you definitely don’t. You still want to thank him for dragging you here when you see him next.

Sarge really does remind you of your father, with one exception-you like Sarge.

“Enough about all them. Let’s hear about you, son.”

“Me? Well, what would you like to know?” Please, nothing about the last group you were in. You aren’t sure this group would be too keen on keeping someone around who plotted mutiny.

“Any specialties? How good are you with a gun? We could use a better sniper.”

“Sorry, I’m no sharpshooter. I’m decent, though. And if you have anything techy lying around, I’m sure I could repair it! I’m great with computers.” You embellish yourself a bit, you won’t lie. You aren’t even close to being a good shot. Plus, you’re good  
with working computers, not building them out of scrap. Unless this base is outfitted with its own system, there’s nothing you can do.

“Hmmph. I suppose we can find a use for you. Get that fake leg on and meet me at the armory, we should find you something that fits.” Sarge doesn’t wait to hear you protest that you can’t quite walk yet, as you’ve never tried it with one foot missing. You yell for Doc.


	4. Zombies and robots

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Do you like blue team? Here comes the blue team!)

Lopez is a lifesaver, you’ve decided. The new leg he has made for you is way easier to use than you thought it was going to be. However, there’s no way you’re able to walk any distance longer than about three feet without falling, so Doc gives you a crutch with it for now.

Donut has outfitted you in slightly-scraped maroon armor, which is a bit heavy but surprisingly comfortable. Sarge approves of the new armor, and goes over a few base rules. You’re not thrilled to hear you have to wear the armor for essentially the entire day, especially if going outside, but sacrifices of comfort must sometimes be made. Plus, the armor has temperature control, which means that while you’re inside it, the weather isn’t as annoying.  
The base is outfitted with three generators, all with backups. Sarge is working on finding a way to make them powered by nature. For some reason he’s set on water, even though there is no river anywhere nearby and solar is a much more efficient way of harvesting energy. Good luck explaining that.  
Once Sarge ends his little tour around the red half of the base, he drags you over to the blue side. You can immediately tell the differences, as if there was some sort of invisible line cutting through the middle of the base, and it was Red vs. Blue on either side. The blue side isn’t nearly as clean, and as soon as you cross over you are greeted by a circle of blue-armored soldiers screaming at each other. You’re glad Sarge told you which color was which, their armor is all blue to you.

“That’s not the fucking point! Whether or not you had one or not, you would miss a shot!”

“No, it is the fucking point! We will never know that, because some asshole won’t give up the fucking sniper rifle!”

“Tucker, for the last time, I am not giving you the motherfucking sniper rifle!”

“At least I can shoot straight!”

“That’s the only thing straight you can do.” A third voice joins the conversation by descending into the fray. Church steps back while Tex walks up between them, but Tucker turns to reel on her.

“What the hell are you implying?”

“Tucker, you have had sex with only three people: Junior’s mother, Sister, and Donut.”

“What? No! That’s not true! Who the fuck told you?”

“You did! You give over very useful information when you’re tipsy.” Tex is laughing to herself, and as Church starts to chuckle Tucker’s anger boils over, and he reaches to the sky to try and find a rebuttal.

“I am not gay!” he finally yells.

“Tucker, nobody said that! We only said that you aren’t straight!”

“That’s the same thing!”

“Actually, it…really isn’t.” you may have said that a bit louder than you thought you had said that. It gets their attention-and Tucker’s anger.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Well, it’s not really gay OR straight, it’s more…somewhat gay, somewhat straight. Y’know, bisexual, pansexual, that sort of thing.” You feel your voice lose volume as you keep talking, until it tapers off. There is nothing said for a moment.

“Blue team, meet red team’s new soldier! Simmons, meet blue team.” Sarge just shrugs off the awkward silence like it is nothing, and as you’re introduced, you weakly wave at the blue team.

“Huh. Never really thought about that.” Tucker admits, more to himself than anyone else.

“How could you not? We have sister on our team!” Church resumes yelling at Tucker. Tex puts a hand over her helmet before pushing through and walking over to where you reds stand.

“Hello, new red. Simmons, was it?”

“Yes ma’am.” You wish you could see faces through the helmet, because the long pause accompanying Tex just standing there and staring at you would be a little less creepy if you could follow the patterns of her eyes. You are suddenly thankful for the  
strict armor rules-Tex can’t see how terrified you must look. You may not have been here for long, but you don’t need to have been-you’ve heard the stories. Even Donut’s chatters (that you mostly tuned out) mentioned how she was, and you aren’t up to taking on a half-tiger half-shark mix.

“You can sure pick ‘em, Sarge.” Tex shakes her head, not bothering to wait for anything else before walking off somewhere else. Sarge and you take that as a sign the blues aren’t exactly up for conversation right now and Sarge marches off. As you follow behind him, you hear the blues arguing in the background. How do they get anything done if all they do is yell at each other? Then again, all the reds really do is yell at each other, it’s all part of the charm.

“Anyway, Simmons, this is what I wanted to show you.” Sarge says, popping a steel rod out of a set of large bay doors. He kicks the door open with a foot, and you know immediately why he wanted to show you this. There’s a vehicle bay, housing one smashed-up car and one extremely large tank.  
You could destroy the entire world with that thing. The possibilities are endless.

“Simmons, meet Sheila.” Sarge declares with the kind of gusto you’d expect from an army man. The tank actually turns its turret and points the barrel at you, and you jump back behind Sarge.

“Sarge, why is that thing pointing at us?” you ask. Totally calmly. You totally don’t just scream “OH FUCK” and hide behind your commanding officer.

“You said you were good with computers-so meet our state-of-the-art tank! She’s outfitted with a basic AI, but she won’t shoot you. Hopefully.” Sarge chuckles, and the tank “looks” away, returning back to its idle position. You can’t help but move closer for a better look-if Sarge is telling the truth, this base is way more advanced than you previously thought.

 

 

This base is way more advanced than you previously thought. The tank is actually outfitted with an AI that helps it target things. For a second, you’re certain you’re dreaming. If you are, you don’t ever want to wake up.  
While you spend a moment looking at Sheila’s system, Sarge leaves, muttering something about work to do. You spend as much time as you can figuring out how exactly Sheila works-well, you’d spend longer if she didn’t forcibly remove you with death threats. Best not to get on the tank’s wrong side.

“Sheila, are there any other AIs here?”

“There’s supposed to be one working throughout the base, but as of yet, all attempts to repair it have failed.” You’re dreaming. There’s no way this is real. You pinch your arm, and it hurts-but nothing changes. You’re still standing in the vehicle bay.  
The tool shed is just a past memory. Everything has changed. For better or for worse.


	5. Night of the first day

The day goes by quicker than you expected, and soon it’s gone. You enjoy a decent meal-you don’t even care that Grif is complaining about being cut down on rations again, you haven’t had good food like this for a long time. Cooking is not your strong point. After dinner, you take on the task of cleaning up the kitchen-you actually volunteer for it, which baffles both teams. It’s not too difficult to handle, actually-standing is pretty easy, it’s walking you can’t do yet. When you finally finish the chore, the sun is long since gone. You decide to do something you should have done hours ago, and go to thank Grif, who’s already sleeping. He sleeps a lot, apparently. You ignore the hand-written “KEEP OUT” sign and force your way in, loud enough to wake him up. His room is like a college dorm from hell, and you regret not having armor on before coming in.

“Simmons? What the hell?”

“Jesus, your room is a mess-how can you stand living in here?”

“What are you doing in my room?”

“Believe me, I’m asking the same question-“

“Simmons!” Grif yells. He does not look amused.

“I…wanted to thank you.”

“Couldn’t it have waited until morning?”

“You apparently sleep all day, so…no.”

“Well, you’re fucking welcome. Leave.”

“Grif, I’m serious.”

“So am I. Get out, I’m tired.” You sigh. You weren’t expecting this, and to be frank you’re a bit disappointed. Grif really is just the dirtbag Sarge makes him out to be. This news upsets you a little bit, for some reason or other.

“Alright, whatever. Don’t accept my thanks, asshole.” You shrug it off internally, turning and starting out the room. The bed under Grif squeaks, alerting you that he has gone back to sleep. Let it go, Simmons, your better judgment screams, and true to it you hobble out of the trash dump. The perfection of this base is slightly diminished by its other residents. That thought carries with you as you find the quarters set aside for you. Thankfully, there aren’t too many soldiers here anymore-you don’t have to sleep in the bunks. The room you are given is right next door to Grif’s room-figures. It’s bland, it’s small, and it’s cold.

Now that you think on it, it really isn’t too much better than the tool shed.

Grif’s right. You are a negative person. You sigh, hopping over to the bed and sitting down to remove the fake leg you now tote. The crutch bangs onto the floor, followed momentarily by the prosthetic. Your pathetic little lump barely hangs over the edge of the shitty mattress.

You don’t remember falling asleep. As far as you know, you don’t sleep at all.


	6. Dusk

Let’s be honest, Simmons. The next few months aren’t worth talking about in excessive detail. Your day-to-day life, now that you aren’t constantly in fear of zombies, is rather boring. You finally learned to walk again, sure, but what else? You look back and realize that you’ve found a routine.

Of your teammates, you wake up first. You are getting good at getting in armor quickly-the first few times took a bit of effort. The sun usually isn’t up, but sometimes you’ll have slept in a bit and it will be cresting the horizon. You make yourself some breakfast and sit on the base wall, watching the sun rise and taking some time just to think. As soon as everyone else awakens, it’s harder to do just that. All the commotion makes it hard to just quietly exist, so you get it out of the way before everything begins.  
Sarge wakes soon after you, and immediately begins to patrol. It’s as if Sarge doesn’t trust the military base to not be filled with zombies when he isn’t looking. He’s paranoid about security, and checks every nook and cranny as if it will somehow be leaking monsters. On the very rare morning, Sarge will also sit on the wall with you in quiet existence. The two of you will not speak. You learned quickly that you and Sarge have nothing in common, and as much as you admire him, you know better than to ruin the sunrises. It’s as close as you will ever be. It’s fitting, in an odd way.

When Donut rises, it’s just like a Disney princess film. He wakes every day with a sense of perfection, as if today is going to be the day everything stops sucking and his imaginary love interest will come in and sweep him off his feet. He never has a bad morning, only bad moments. He doesn’t mind ruining sunrises, either. You despise him on those rare days, when he comes in and smashes the calm silence with his cheeriness. Other mornings, you merely dislike his charm. Donut, however, either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.  
You have about half an hour between the time Donut gets up and the time Sarge asks you to go get Grif. The past few months have been an odd case with Grif. You two carry the same relationship you had the first day you met-you hate each other, but every once in a while you like each other. The two of you have found your own little routine-you tease. You bicker. Sometimes you fight. Sometimes your fighting sends one of you to Doc with injuries.

You wake Grif up, and the day becomes one of two days. You either stay in the base all day, fixing up what needs fixing and investigating the AI system looped through the base in your spare time, or you go out into the city. The AI system is a challenge of its own kind. You learned that Sheila was a relatively quick fix, but the onboard AI has nothing easy to it. Someone somehow smarter than you really took their time with destroying this system. It was elegantly done, as if the system is breaking itself while you try to fix it. Grif constantly wonders why you even bother with it if all it does is piss you off and make less sense with each passing day. You’re not really sure why you can’t let it go, but you just can’t shake the feeling that it is something of great importance. As for the city, it’s always different, even if you come back to the same spaces. There’s always something new to find, surprisingly. You don’t dwell on why there’s always something out in the city. You don’t dwell on the thought that the supplies you find might be left behind from other survivors. You don’t dwell on the idea that you are doing to them what Grif was originally going to do to you-taking all their shit and getting the fuck out. Serves them, right?  
Either possible day saddles you with Grif. You two, for all the hatred you have of each other, spend quite a bit of time together. When outside in the city, the two of you always end up going off in a different direction than Sarge and Donut. Lopez always goes alone, you’re unsure why (the answer is in Spanish, you suppose). When you’re inside the base, Grif hovers around you to pretend he’s doing work. You two spend the time teasing each other while you actually do the work both of you should be doing. It’s a system.

The day ends with delightful dinner conversation between both teams. By delightful, you mean god awful. If you aren’t all fighting, you’re sitting alone or in small groups. Even the apocalypse can’t make enemies like each other. Sarge always takes the early night shift, which means the evening is yours to do as you want with it. Sometimes you keep messing with the AI systems, sometimes a bonfire will be held and everyone will start drinking. Sometimes you just go to bed. Sometimes, you end the day the way you start it. You sit on the wall, watching the sun complete the cycle. The sun sets, and you retire the day. You sleep until the cycle begins again.  
Right now, as you’re reflecting on all the nothing that’s happened, the sun is setting. You’re sitting on the wall, overlooking the last golden rays of daytime. You reflect on everything because the way the light illuminates everything makes you feel sentimental. 

It would make anyone feel sentimental. Dusk has that effect on people, you suppose. Dusk tells you that the day is over, and you made it. Today’s cycle is almost over, dusk whispers, and you just smile in the golden light.

You forgot to mention-unlike the mornings, it isn’t rare for you to have company in the dusk hours. Actually, it’s rare when you aren’t joined by Grif. It’s not as if you haven’t had enough of his bullshit during the day, it’s just that dusk is…well, dusk is special. When the two of you sit here, you get all sentimental or metaphysical. The others call it pillow-talking, but you don’t see it as that. You and Grif aren’t anything close to a couple, and the thought alone is gag-worthy. It’s just nice to ponder the mysteries of the world every once in a while. Everything feels like it used to, when the only thing destroyed was the economy and people would bicker over trivial issues.

“Hey, Grif?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you ever wonder why we’re here?”

“It’s one of life’s great mysteries, isn’t it? I mean, why are we here? Are we the product of some cosmic coincidence, or is there really a god watching everything? You know, with a plan for us and stuff.” You look over at Grif, and he just shrugs at you. “I don’t know, man. It keeps me up at night.”

“What?” you ask, completely confused. You know Grif can get deep sometimes, but this is a new kind of topic entirely. Religion has never come up in past discussions. You always assumed the only people who even cared about religion were Sarge and Doc-Sarge because he does believe, Doc because he doesn’t want to offend anyone. You’ve had suspicions about Church, but don’t care enough to find out if he is. Grif, however, doesn’t seem the type to you.

“What?” he echoes back, looking a bit confused and slightly nervous. You know him well enough to know that’s he’s afraid he’s said too much with that.

“I meant why are we here, in this military base? We could easily just leave and find a safe spot that doesn’t involve listening to orders and being soldiers.”

“Oh.”

“What was that about god?”

“Nothing.” He closes off, looking away from you to the setting sun. You look off at it too.

“Wanna talk about it?” you ask after a long moment, looking back over at his illuminated face. You refuse to have a moment where you ponder his features in the totally-not-romantic light. You know what Grif’s face looks like, and the change in lighting doesn’t make you want to look at him any more than you normally would. Not even dusk can change that.

“No.”

“You sure?” a well-placed jab to his tubby stomach accompanies your teasing tone of voice. He glares at you, but he’s not really angry.

“Yeah. I’m sure.” Grif looks off at the sun again. You have a moment where you ponder his features in the totally-not-romantic light. He’s not actually so bad, just very round. He has good bone structure, and he isn’t really much of an eye-sore. Hell, if he  
got in shape the guy could be very handsome. Fuck, you just said you weren’t going to do that!

“Seriously, though. Do you ever-“

“Not really. It’s safe here, there’s plenty of food, running water, and electricity. Why would you give that up for a life of getting stuck in tool sheds?”

“Hey! I resent that!”

“You’re supposed to. It means I’m doing it right, jackass.” He smirks at you. You despise the totally-not-romantic light. It makes him look halfway decent.

“You’ve never once thought about leaving?”

“Maybe a few times. When the apocalypse happened, my plan was originally to go to Alaska. Zombies can’t survive in the cold, their blood freezes up before they can get far north. But the plan changed. Even if I still wanted to go up there, Kaikaina is safer here.”

“Now you sound like Tucker.”

“Shut up. Not all of us are loners, Simmons.”

“Did you just call me a loser?”

“Loner. With an N. Though you are the biggest loser I know.” you hit him. He hits you back.

“I’m not a loner by choice, you know. It just happened.”

“You never did tell what happened with your last group.”

“It doesn’t need to be mentioned.” It’s your turn to stare off at the sun and pretend the conversation is over. In the back of your mind, you momentarily wonder if Grif is also having a moment where he ponders your features in the totally-not-romantic light of dusk. Honestly, what is wrong with you? You should get some more sleep or something, you’re losing it.

“What, did you murder someone?”

“No!”

“So what’s so bad about it? It’s not like it matters anymore.”

“I got kicked out, okay? That’s it. End of story.”

“Why were you kicked out? Too much ass-kissing to their leader?”

“Just the opposite, actually.”

“What, Simmons, the professional kiss-ass, didn’t suck up to leadership? Now you have to tell me!” he nudges you, and it’s your turn to glare halfheartedly at him.

“Their leader was an asshole.”

“And Sarge isn’t?”

“No! Sarge is a great leader!”

“He’s not here, no need to kiss up.” Grif rolls his eyes at you. You sigh, forcing your attention to the distance. The horizon. The metaphorical future. The sun is gone, and it will only be moments before the last lights it casts off are also. The weirdest part of the evening is this part. The end of dusk. When the sun is gone, it always feels like something that is building between you and your orange teammate is leaving with it. You suppose the lighting really does make the mood. You have only seconds left before the golden light is gone and the two of you are hit with a sense of dark awkwardness.

“Grif, do you ever think about-” you start, not quite knowing what you’re trying to say. The light leaves the sky entirely, followed by darkness. The horizon is soon to be just a black blob against a midnight sky. So much for metaphors.

“Think about what?” he asks, but whatever it was is lost to you.

“Nothing. Don’t know.” The darkness overtakes everything. In a matter of minutes, the same daytime awkwardness settles around you both. Grif moves away from you, and then it’s obvious there’s nothing left to say tonight. It’s the usual routine.

“In that case, I’m going to bed. Night, Simmons.” Grif stands up, stretches, and walks away. Sitting still on the edge of the military base you now call home, you would be lying if you didn’t wish the sun would come back up for five more minutes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was much longer to make up for chapter 5 being a short little thing.


	7. Washington

The blues are out in the city the next day. You spend some time alone on gate-keeping duty. You don’t feel like being teased right now. As you idle the daylight away, you notice something very odd. Tucker comes back early. Your internal alarms go off as he starts yelling for you to open the gate up.

“Why? What happened?”

“Shit’s going down, now open up!” Tucker screams up at you, and you take just a second to glance down. He’s carrying an unconscious man in his arms, and though the stranger’s shirt is dark, you can see blood stains. The rest of the blue team crests over the hill, and they too are sprinting. You waste no more time hopping down from your guard’s perch and opening the gate for them. The stranger looks like a younger Sarge-at least, he’s covered in as many scars and has the same salt-and-pepper hair, just a bit lighter. More blonde, too. Plus, his skin is darker and dotted with freckles. You don’t get to make any more observations about him, because Tucker is literally sprinting to Doc, despite the weight in his arms. Junior notices his father is back early, and runs over to greet him. Tucker doesn’t stop to say hello, he has more important things to worry about. So do you, as the rest of the blue team runs in the gate.

“Jesus, when did Tucker learn to run so fast?” Church pants out. Caboose, calmly breathing beside him, only shrugs.

“What happened out there?” you ask as they catch their breath.

“We got into some shit. This guy came out of nowhere, told us to run, and before he could explain what was happening he was shot.” Tex answers.

“Shot? Zombies can’t do that-“

“No fucking shit, Simmons.” Church snaps at you. “It was two guys in armor. As soon as the guy went down, they came after us.”

“Armor? Armor like ours?” you ask Tex.

“Like ours, except way more high-tech.”

“Plus they had stripes!” Caboose fills in. “They are better at fashion than we are.” Caboose is ignored. Tex climbs up the guard post and looks out at the area. Nobody says anything for a long moment as you all wait for her verdict.

“Nothing. Either they didn’t follow us or they’re gone. Either way, this gate stays closed for a while.” Tex barks down, and the majority of you nod. “Simmons, go make sure Sarge knows.” You salute her and run off.  
The next few hours are tricky ones. Tex stations guards looking out in every direction. The rest of you wait for the verdict on the stranger. Doc eventually comes out to tell you that he is still alive, but will not be awake for a while. There is a sigh of relief among the blue team members.

“How long before he wakes up?” Sarge asks. Doc only shrugs.

“Could be a few minutes, could be a few hours. I don’t know.”

“Caboose, you’re on watch for him. Let us know when he’s awake.” Tex orders. Caboose nods, and pushes past Doc into the medical room. “Grif, Tucker, Simmons, go take over for Sister, Donut, and Lopez. Sarge, take over for Sheila. Keep your eyes peeled, I want to know if anything so much as sways in the breeze.” Texas is in her element when she is giving orders for others to follow. The blonde, semi-kind woman underneath the pitch armor is almost completely forgotten. There is only the black-armored soldier giving orders to her crew. As a crewman, you follow those orders.  
If you were expecting any threat to actually appear, tough luck. Two days later, nothing has happened. Tex is visibly pissed at the fact that whoever was after the stranger hasn’t shown up-or maybe she’s just pissed in general. You weren’t there when the stranger woke up, since Tex has most of the reds guarding the walls at all times. None of you complain about it-not even Sarge wants to deal with Tex in a bad mood.

 

The stranger is called Washington. He claims to be a member of a group that travels around, the freelancers. Tex apparently used to travel with them, hence her state name. Washington was separated from his group about a week ago when he and a friend, CT, went out on a simple run. The two were attacked by some mercenaries, hired on to find…something. Washington isn’t even clear on all the details. He’d been on the run ever since, trying to avoid the mercs and find CT. Turns out the mercenaries were better at tracking than he thought, because they found him first. That’s when the blues showed up, Wash was shot, and the rest is common knowledge.

The first time you actually meet Washington, you can tell why Texas lumped herself in with this freelancer group. The first time you actually meet Washington, it’s the crack of dawn and he’s practicing throwing a knife at a target about 50 meters away from him-backwards. You think it’s a good idea to go up on the wall instead of staying where you could be accidentally killed. It’s interesting to watch him, though, as he throws knives at a wooden crate. You don’t really watch the blues too often-there is a divide down the middle of the base, whether an actual line exists or not-so you don’t really know much about their mornings. You’re not too surprised to see Tex come join this Washington guy and have a morning discussion. That’s the thing about ex-soldiers-they never seem to sleep.  
You can’t hear any of the conversation, but it ends with one last knife throw before Tex marches off. Washington retrieves the knife, but instead of going back to throwing it, he leaves into the shadows off to the blue side. Washington prefers to be around them, which is fine. No need for all of you to have your lives threatened because Tucker dragged one guy from a firefight.  
You don’t expect to suddenly be joined up on the wall this morning. Especially not by Washington.

“Hey, you.” He asks randomly, and you’re not sure how he snuck up here without you noticing. Or, for that matter, how he got up here so fast. He’s like a big cat of some kind-a puma.

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You’re one of the reds, correct?” he carries the same authoritative tone as Tex, only not as harsh. You nod your head.

“Simmons. You’re that Washington guy, right?”

“Yeah. Wash. Anything happening out there?”

“You do realize I’m not actually on guard duty right now-“

“I know. Anything happening out there?” He repeats, a bit more forceful the second time. You glance out at the surrounding area, and sure enough, there’s fucking nothing. Just the same trees and grass  
and distant city there always has been.

“No. Nothing’s happened for a week.”

“Doesn’t mean we should be letting our guard down.”

“Why are those guys after you, anyway?” Washington looks visibly confused that you are asking this question. You assume that he’s told the blue team already, and you’re just out of the loop.

“Pardon?”

“The merc guys. What do they want with you? Did you kill someone they know?”

“What? No! I don’t even know them!”

“Then what’s this whole thing about? Seriously, it’s messing everything up here, we deserve to know what’s really going on.” You try your best to be forceful and abrasive like him. He eventually relaxes a little, and you can hear a small relaxed sigh-or maybe an annoyed sigh, you don’t know.

“I don’t know a lot of the details. All I know is that they were hired to keep some guy away from some lady, find somebody’s child, and we got caught in the middle of it somehow. Carolina, our leader, was the one who knew what was going on, but she never really told us. Need-to-know sort of thing.”

“That’s bullshit.” You mutter to yourself, but Wash hears you.

“It’s how we work. Freelancers aren’t like you guys, we’re more…”

“Organized?” You offer, but it isn’t the word he’s looking for. He doesn’t try to supply another word, though. You can make one observation about Wash-he is mystery wrapped within the shell of a normal guy. You’ve seen him every once in a while, just in passing. You know he’s nice-especially to Caboose and Junior. He’s a sarcastic shithead, from what you’ve heard from Grif’s retelling of Tucker’s complaints. He’s also militant, which you can tell Sarge is impressed by. You get the impression Sarge likes agent Washington, which unsettles you just a little bit for some reason or other. Hell, everyone likes Wash. You don’t know how he has managed to worm his way into the structure of your group, but he has managed to become the current base favorite. It’s about time to witness this enigma for yourself.

“Terrifying?” You offer, and you swear he cracks a smile.

“We aren’t as bad as you’d think. Trust me, not all of us are like Texas.”

“How many of you are there?”

“There’s me, Carolina, North and South Dakota, CT, York, Maine, Wyoming, and Florida. Sometimes we have this other chick with us, 479er, but she does her own thing.”

“Wow. Eight or nine Tex-like people. That’ll definitely help me sleep at night.” You are sarcastic. Wash actually smiles this time.

“We aren’t anywhere close to being like Texas. Maybe Carolina, but not me for sure.”

“Is Carolina also half-woman, half-shark?” You swear you are about to have a heart attack as you realize that somehow, you have once again missed hearing someone get up on this wall. Sarge is right behind you, like he just rose from the floor. Maybe you should get your hearing checked.

“Don’t let Carolina hear you say that.” Wash says. Sarge chuckles before turning to you.

“Simmons, go get Grif up. I need a word with agent Washington here.” You don’t argue with the order, you learned early on that there is no arguing with Sarge. You march off, but not to wake up your teammate. He won’t willingly rise for at least another hour. As you contemplate what to do with the extra time, you bump into Donut, who isn’t even suited up but is just skipping around the base in what you assume to be his sleep clothes. Don’t look too long, Simmons, the amount of exposed tan skin is captivating to the human eye, and will trap you into a discussion about how it’s okay to express your sexuality. Donut never listens when you try to tell him you’re honestly straight, and every word of protest is met with this sick little head bob and a knowing smile. You hate Donut sometimes.

“Oh hey Simmons! Good morning!” his vowels are stretched out too long, and for someone who literally looks like he just rolled out of bed he is too chipper.

“Hey Donut.” You start trying to walk by him, but you can tell by the way his body turns to follow you that he wants a conversation. You’d take getting a pillow thrown at you by a sleepy Grif rather than have him talk to you right now.

“Simmons, normally you aren’t down here so early-everything okay?”

“It’s fine, Donut. Sarge needed a word with Wash.” Please, Donut, don’t try and turn this into a conversation.

“Oh. Hey, do you want breakfast? I’m about to start in a bit-“ as much as you dislike him, you cannot pass an opportunity for Donut’s delicious cooking. You say yes, he says okey dokey, and you have somehow gotten out of a conversation with Donut. Nice one, Simmons.

You literally have nothing to do, though, for the time being. You could go do what you usually do, go mess with the base AI systems until you feel like throwing things out of frustration. You don’t feel like it, though. You can’t quite explain it, but the fact you’ve been left out of most of the loops around this base is driving you crazy. Do people really think you’re boring or something?  
You have an urge to prove that thought wrong. That urge to do something is what pushes you to this.  
You burst into Grif’s room thirty-four minutes earlier than usual. You’re used to the smell by this point, which doesn’t make it any less revolting. You’re ready for the pillow he chucks at you, and you use it to persuade him to get up. Actually, you just hit him with the pillow until he is awake.

“Simmons, what the fuck-“

“Get up. I have a plan.”

“Fuck off, no plans. I don’t even listen to Sarge’s plans, what makes you think yours is worth moving for?” You roll your eyes at him.

“Because my plan involves getting the fuck out of this stale base and finding something to do.”

“What, you get bored of pretending to be smart?”

“I am smart. I’m also tired of smart. Let’s go be fucking idiots.” Wording it like that is exactly what gets Grif’s attention. He doesn’t expect you to want to do something reckless and stupid, and while you usually don’t, you’re committed to the idea of doing something new for a change.

“You, the smartass, want to go out into the zombie-infected city and be a fucking idiot?”

“We have armor, we won’t be in that much danger.”

“Simmons, are you feeling okay?”

“Just get up and get dressed.” You say on your way out of his room. You walk all the way to the kitchen before the panic begins to hit you. Shoving your face full of food is an excellent way of combating the fear creeping up within you, you can see why Grif always does it. You thank Donut for the meal you ate in approximately five minutes, and head out to the garage on the other end of the base.

“Good morning, Simmons.” Sheila greets you. You exchange the pleasantries, and then set your eyes on the jeep. In the months you’ve been here, that jeep has been through more accidents than you saw in your civilian lifetime. The good thing is that Lopez can fix the jeep in just under forty-five minutes, since he’s had plenty of practice putting that thing back together. You swear, that jeep is cursed. You also know it’s essentially Grif’s jeep, since nobody else can drive it like he can. Not even Lopez.

“Simmons, where are you?” Grif asks over the armor comms.

“I’m in the vehicle bay. Bring the car keys.”

“What are you planning?”

“You’ve seen the Dukes of Hazard, yes?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Bring the car keys.”

“Simmons, I don’t know what’s with you today, but please stay like this. This may just be the best idea ever. Of all time.” He sounds genuinely excited. You have never heard Grif sound so excited about  
anything besides food or a literal keg of beer Tucker found out in the city once. He’s probably stuck in the same rut you are, trapped in this base for so long by Tex’s mini-regime.

You are going to be in so much trouble for this.

You don’t give a fuck.


	8. The dicks of hazard

“We are going to be in so much trouble for this.” You say. Grif is ignoring you, popping his armor back on. You repeat it to yourself four more times before he finally turns his attention to you.

“Shut up Simmons. It’ll be fine.”

“It’ll be fine? IT’LL BE FINE? The jeep is stuck in a ditch and it won’t start! How is this fine?”

“Just get back in armor, we’ll figure something out.” He is trying to remain cool, but you know he’s nervous too. Sarge and Lopez are going to murder you both.

The jeep is stuck. The engine is probably busted.

Also there might be a line of fire leading back into the city.

You two shouldn’t have done that. Especially not for two hours.  
Why did it even take two hours? You had no idea Grif would even be committed to doing something for more than five minutes before getting bored.  
Grif is already back in full armor, and you start pulling on your own pieces. You’re faster than he is, at the very least, so it doesn’t take long to click everything into place. He hands you your helmet when you’re done, and you pull it on.  
There’s been several contact attempts from Sarge. A few contact attempts from Donut.  
One contact attempt from Tex.

“We are so dead.” Grif straightens a little when you say it. “Dude, Tex tried to get our comms. She knows we left. What are we supposed to do now?”

“We’re gonna have to leave the car. There’s no way we can get it out.”

“Are we just gonna walk back then?”

“Is there another option?” Grif whines, ever the lazy one.

“We could wait for Sarge and Tex to come find us and murder us, does that count as another option?” You snap at him. You’re at the edge of your rope here, Simmons.

“Well-“

“We’re walking. Let’s go, fatass.” You turn and walk toward the direction of the base. Grif lumbers after you. Ignore the limp in your step, Simmons. Ignore the bruise on your shoulder and the marks you know are all over Grif. Ignore the cut on your cheek and the stitched-up gash in Grif’s leg. You will take the last two hours to your grave, Simmons. Absolutely nobody can ever know about the strange adventure that was the past two hours. You look back at Grif, and he nods, and you know you’ve both made a pact to never EVER mention it all again.

 

It’s actually much easier to walk through the city now, since the streets have long since been abandoned. There’s the occasional group of zombies lurking nearby, but the armor does have its perks-for instance, zombies can’t smell you through it. They can see you, sure, but usually they register you as one of their own. They don’t have good eyesight, after all.  
The city used to be something oh so great, but now it’s just a ton of empty buildings and abandoned cars. You know Church loves to raid the empty office buildings, because usually they have coffee in them. The guy practically bleeds coffee, so living without it in a hellscape like this is a big challenge for him. It’s partially why he’s such an asshole. Mainly, he’s just hardwired to be an asshole.

“Dude, Simmons!” speaking of assholes, the one you’re stuck with has stopped walking and started yelling. You turn around to see Grif practically jumping up and down next to an abandoned car.

“What the fuck are you screaming about?”

“Look at this old beauty! Someone just left her in the middle of the street! And dude, there’s food in the backseat!” Grif yells as he rips his helmet off and smooshes his face into the back window. You can’t help but see what he’s fussing over, and sure enough, a vintage green Mercedes sits with a load full of food. It looks well-kept, and in complete condition.

“Who the fuck would leave a car like this out here?”

“Who cares? Let’s steal it!”

“Grif, no!”

“Why not?”

“This thing is in way too good condition for it not to be someone else’s!”

“All the more reason. It probably works if it belongs to someone!”

“Grif!”

“Dude, the keys are in there!”

“Wait, what?”

“The keys! They are in there! Cmon, when are we going to get another chance at a car like this?”

“Why is it here then?”

“Who cares? We’re taking it.”

“Grif, think about it. Who would leave a perfectly good car full of supplies in the middle of the street?” The two of you ponder it for a second. This car is either an obvious trap or a big mistake on the owner’s part. Either way, the unmanned car is concerning to you.

“Fuck it.” Grif says as he struts around the car and tries the car door. When it doesn’t pop open, he backs up about two feet and fills the window with bullets, then knocks out the glass. The alarm starts blaring, so he quickly jumps in and leans across to swing open the passenger door. You get in just as he starts up the car-both of you cheer as you realize it has gas in it. You hear agitated yelling from a building, and someone runs out from down the street.

Orange stripes on grey armor.

One of the mercs after Washington.  
Grif steps on the gas, and the two of you drive away with what you assume to be his car.  
The mercenary runs after you for a while, and occasionally you hear gunshots. They aren’t actually hitting the car, though. The guy must really care about this car, if he won’t even fire at you while you steal it. Eventually, you lose sight of him entirely.  
The car is fucking awesome. It drives very smoothly and very quickly, and the engine purrs like a kitten. The interior is spotless apart from the pile of food in the backseat, and the seats are brown leather.  
The two of you glance over at each other. Grif starts to laugh. His laugh is contagious.  
He pops off his helmet, tosses it into the backseat, and leans to his left. The wind rushes through his hair, and he cheers very loudly. You take off your helmet and set it in your lap, moving to roll down the passenger window. The wind is cold at the speed he’s driving. You have to reach up with a hand to keep your glasses on, and you fight to keep your eyes open.  
Grif whoops, laughing as he swerves around a pothole. You cheer with him as you get tossed around due to Grif’s awful driving, but you don’t really mind it as you toss your arms up and back, letting lose with him. The rush of adrenaline overcomes the two of you, and while you two laugh Grif pulls the car to a stop in some neighborhood area near the outskirts of town, wiping moisture from his eyes.

“Holy shit was that fun.” Grif chuckles, grinning. You nod in agreement, grinning back.  
The two of you laugh at each other for a moment. Your eyes meet. There’s nothing but the sound of the car engine and your breathing.

“We should get back.” You say.

“What’s another half hour?” Grif shrugs. You’re confused as he’s suddenly leaning toward you.

“Grif-” you start, leaning back and reflexively raising your hands. Grif keeps leaning.

“Yes Simmons?” fuck, he’s barely muttering, that’s how close he is. You put your hands back down, but keep leaning back into your chair. Grif is leaning on the center console heavily.

“What are you-“

“Cmon, Dick, you can’t tell me you don’t-” it rolls off Grif’s tongue like an afterthought, and his hand comes up and grabs the back of your head, fingers curling through your hair.

“Don’t what?” You ask, but you don’t care to hear the answer. You’re riding high on an adrenaline rush and the smell of good car leather, and you know you’re going to regret it. It may just ruin the dynamic the two of you have perfected. You ignore the nagging voice in your head and replace it with what are supposed to be romantic notions about Grif-though really it’s just all the good things he’s done, shone on with the light of dusk.  
You aren’t sure what you don’t.  
You can say what you do. You lean forward ever so slightly.

Grif shifts his legs and bumps the gas pedal. The car lurches forward about three inches.  
You catapult against his face. The smack of both of your teeth behind your lips hurts momentarily. He shifts the car into park, and you squirm a little bit closer to try again. The kiss is awkward, and with the center console in the way there’s only one way to be very comfortable.

“Move over here.” Grif breaks off for a second, but moves no farther away from your face. He practically says it against your lower lip, which muffles it, but you get the idea.

“Maybe if you didn’t take up the entire chair, fatass.”

“Just move over here!” He rolls his eyes, and you do pull away for a second. The best you can do is shift up onto the center console and turn back to him. He catches your right thigh with his hand, pulling you all the way across his lap. You bump your head on the ceiling, and when he pulls you down he does it just fast enough where the two of you smack skulls.

“Watch it!” Grif snaps.

“You watch it!” You snap back, scowling at him as you shift your hips forward a little to sit more comfortable. You can fit on his lap surprisingly well, given how much space it takes up. You steady yourself with surprisingly calm hands on his shoulders. Grif pushes forward to kiss you again, and just after your lips meet he pushes a bit too far and sets off the car horn. It beeps loudly, and you flinch in reflex, pushing forward and smacking your nose into his cheekbone. There’s a sharp pain in your nose as you realize those chubby cheeks only cushion so much.

“Hey, Simmons?” Grif asks as he rubs his cheek. You push up and put all your weight onto your knees, which pushes your head up against the ceiling again.

“Yeah?”

“Your nose is bleeding.” You reach up and immediately feel small drops of blood running from your nose. Grif starts laughing, and you huff in annoyance.

“Open the door.” You order, and Grif pops open the driver’s side door. You slink off his lap and fall to the ground in a clutter of limbs. Grif keeps laughing as you stalk around the car, sitting back in on the passenger side. So much for romantic notions.

“We don’t talk about this.” You say in a complete monotone.

“Whatever you say.” Grif shrugs it all off with a collected smile as he puts the car back into gear and starts to drive off. Somehow, you don’t really feel that different about him, despite having just been sprawled over his lap. Only Grif could make something you always considered intimate into something so…you want to say platonic, but a tiny red tint to your face won’t let you. Maybe that’s just the nosebleed talking, you aren’t sure.

“And you’re horrible at kissing.” You tell him in an effort to discourage him. This should never happen again. The smell of good car leather is clogged out of your nose, and the adrenaline rush has died down entirely. The reality is setting in, and you are gawking at yourself for even considering kissing him of all people. What would Sarge say? Oh goodness, what would Donut say? Donut would never let it go that you two kissed! He would never believe you were straight then!

“That wasn’t really kissing, that was just a calamity.” Grif calms your thoughts with his apathetic tone. You push all the momentary panic to the back of your mind and focus on stopping your nose from bleeding.

“Just get us back to the base.”  
There is nothing but silence for a few minutes. You fiddle with the radio, but the previous owner of the car had some weird music tastes, so you turn it back off.

“Can I at least get a retry later?” Grif asks when you are about five miles from the military base. He reaches over the center console to touch your leg. You push his hand off and squirm as far into the passenger door as you can.

“Shut up and drive, Grif.” You snap through a plugged nose. It briefly occurs to you that you didn’t say no.


	9. Felix

Sarge blows up when the two of you return to base. He goes on a small rant about how the two of you need to be more careful, and berates you for whatever it is you have done. He pauses as he realizes he never asked what you two had been doing. He also pauses when he realizes you did not come back in the car you left with. However, the appeal of the vintage Mercedes calms him down almost entirely. In fact, he compliments you-only you, despite Grif insisting it was his idea-and gives you a smack on the back and a job well done. You have never felt true joy until this moment.  
The blue team practically starts drooling over the new car. Tucker makes a crack on how easy it would be to pick up babes in it. Church reclines one of the seats and tries to take a nap, but can’t because Caboose keeps beeping the horn. Church tells him to go watch the front gate. Lopez is crying in Spanish over the engine, which you assume to be happy crying. Wash eventually starts a fight with Tucker, both of them arguing over how easy it would be to fuck in the car. You do not tell them that it’s smaller than it looks, since that would require too much explanation. Donut is giving you and Grif a weird look that you aren’t quite sure how to explain. Doc is appalled at all the injuries you’ve gotten, demanding you come by the office as soon as possible. Tex is not so impressed with the new car. She demands to know where the old one is. She also demands to know what you were doing and demands a chance to beat both of you senseless. You ask if she would be okay with only beating one of you senseless. Sarge suggests Grif. Grif tries to convince her you’re Grif. She just smacks him upside the head. She’s a lot less angry when you tell her the Mercedes belonged to one of the mercs, and takes back the whole “beating-senseless” idea.  
That’s when Caboose starts yelling.

“Church! Church! There is someone at the door!”

“Tell them to fuck off, we are busy at the moment!”

“But he says we have stolen his car!” Caboose yells back, which gains the group’s attention. You and Grif share a look before the entire group moves, rushing over to see what the guy wants.

“Who are you and what do you want?” Tex asks with her gun raised.

“Hello! My name’s Felix, and I would like my car back! Two of your soldier-guys stole it earlier this afternoon!” The guy-Felix-isn’t wearing a helmet. He’s got a weird case of baby-face, but you assume he has to be older than twenty-five. There’s no way he’s actually as young as he looks. He looks very Asian to you. An Asian punk. He has around fifteen piercings in his face from what you can see up here, and his hair is black at the roots and orange at the top. His helmet is tucked under his arm, and he is grinning up at all of you, perched on the edge of the base. He locks eyes on you and Grif, and his face changes from annoyed but pleasant to downright murderous.

“Finders-keepers, dude.” Grif yells down. Felix doesn’t like that answer.

“Look, the car has a lot of sentimental value, okay? Plus, like, a shit ton of supplies. Without the car, how am I going to survive?” Felix makes the human equivalent of puppy eyes.

“I’m sure you’ll be alright without all the vodka bottles, candy bars, and condoms you have in there. Run along.” Wash says as he climbs up onto the wall. He scowls down at Felix. Felix looks shocked for a second, but his expression softens.

“Washington! You’re still alive, huh?”

“I am, no thanks to you.”

“Oh come on, what’s a bullet or two between friends, right?”

“Where’s the other one?”

“Beg pardon?”

“You travel with another mercenary. Where is he?”

“You mean Locus? He’s not here. Apparently he didn’t think the car was worth all this hassle. I do. Hand it over.” Felix changes voice tones so often, you can’t keep track. He is terrifying, then charming, then terrifying again.

“Not until you give us some answers.”

“Let me inside your base, then we’ll talk.”

“Oh no, you aren’t coming in here.”

“Alright, alright. Look, we got off on the wrong foot, Washy. Can I call you Washy?”

“No you may not.”

“Washy, we were not hired to hurt you or your little punk girlfriend. Heck, I like her, she reminds me of myself. So I would like to formally apologize for shooting you, can I please have my car back?”

“Wait-Connie?”

“If by Connie you mean CT, yeah. She’s fine, by the way. In more than just the good-health sense, if you catch my drift.”

“What have you done with her?” Wash is almost fuming at this point, his gun raised and finger on the trigger.

“Relax, Washy, I haven’t done anything to her. We did have to break the arms of the guy who came after you two, though. You know, big guy, bald?”

“Maine?” Wash sounds about as confused as the rest of you feel. Tucker glances over to Grif, who shrugs. Caboose looks like he has missed the entire point of this conversation.

“Is that his name? Guy wouldn’t tell us. Hell, he hasn’t said anything since he got here.”

“Where are they?” Wash sounds nearly frantic.

“Give me the car back and I’ll drive you there.” Felix says in a tone of voice you feel is much too flirtatious for this situation. Wash puts his gun down and turns to look at Texas.

“It’s a trap.” She tells him.

“I know.”

“Even if they are there, do you think they’ll let you leave?”

“Probably not.”

“Wash, cmon. We could take this one captive. If what you said is true, the other one will come for him eventually. Then we trade him and the car for Maine and CT.” Tex offers. Wash takes a second, pondering the idea. He glances down at Felix. Even behind his helmet, you can practically see the worried expression he sports. Tex waits for a response.

“Just might work. Hey, Felix!”

“Yes, dear?” Felix replies in a voice drenched in sugary sarcasm.

“We’re letting you in. Don’t try anything stupid.” Wash warns him, getting down off the wall. The blue team follows him, as does Sarge. When Wash signals to open the gate, Felix is met by a wall of people with guns, and already has his hands up.

“Alright, take me to the car, I take you to your friends. Deal?”

“Just walk with us.” Wash demands, starting off. Felix has put his helmet back on, but you swear he’s smirking under that armor, as if he knows what you’re all planning to do.  
As if he wants you to take him prisoner.  
You don’t get to think on it too long before you’re being yanked into the embrace of a tiny pink soldier. Grif is under his other arm, trying to squirm away.

“Don’t think we’ve all forgotten about you two! What were you guys doing for two and a half hours, huh?” Donut asks in a tone of voice you don’t want to answer to. You couldn’t be paid to take a momentary glance into Donut’s mind, you do not want to know the horrible thoughts he’s having about you and Grif being off by yourselves. Alone. With a fancy car.

“Donut, we didn’t do anything!”

“Aw, come on! You can tell me, we’re all friends here!”

“There’s more important stuff to deal with than what we were doing, okay?”

“So you admit you two were up to something, huh? C’mon, tell me!” Donut prompts. For someone so small, he has a very good grip.

“I can tell you what we weren’t doing.” Grif mutters, and you glare at him.

“And what’s that?”

“Reenacting the best scene from the Dukes of Hazard.” Donut drops you both, crossing his arms and tutting with his tongue. You and Grif exchange a knowing smile.

“Fine, don’t tell me. I’d be careful if I were you two, though-keep looking at each other like that, and people will catch on to what you’ve been up to.” Donut gives that stupid knowing smile, pops on his helmet, and skips off.

“We haven’t done anything!” You yell after him, but he just waves and says nothing in reply.


	10. The mature way

The base is oddly silent for the next few days. Well, actually, no. The base isn’t silent at all. It’s the people who are quiet. Everyone is just anxious, waiting for the other mercenary to show up.

Felix, however, is anything but quiet.

He talks twice as loud as he needs to. He yells at anyone who passes by the hold. During the night, he snores. He is constantly making noise, even if he’s yelled at to shut up. Even when he’s left alone, he sits and talks to himself-the guy is big on monologues, according to Sister. You are increasingly glad that the blues decided to keep him, and not the reds. Even from your half of the base, the noise is obnoxious.

The nights are getting colder. You mean this metaphorically, since it’s actually the middle of summer and the nights are still too hot. You mean this as the people are getting colder.

Actually, that’s not true either. Tucker and Wash are being very warm toward each other. You can see it from across the base. They have their own little system of flirting. Tucker purposefully acts like a jackass until Wash gets so annoyed he threatens him. Tucker busts out a line while Wash is hot-headed enough to bitterly respond to it. It goes on until Wash gives up and walks away in exasperation. Tucker waits, like, five minutes, and then goes and finds Wash and apologizes. Wash forgives him, and somehow every single time they find something new to open up to each other about. Grif pointed all this out to you, and now you can’t help but notice it. Even Felix notices it, to a degree. Felix is the most vocal about noticing it-but he’s the most vocal about anything. He notices you and Grif being a bit more personable with each other too. You refuse to walk by the hold anymore, you don’t like the feeling of humiliation.  
Being colder is also not true for a lot of the others. Donut hasn’t changed at all, except he’s more prone to smirking. That asshole. Caboose is just as cheery as usual. Doc is still Doc. The blues are still the blues-they have always been this angry.  
Correction, Simmons. You’re the one getting colder.

You’re following the same patterns, it seems. With the last group, you were increasingly apathetic toward the people you were with until it came to the point you were removed. Here, however, you aren’t becoming apathetic, you’re just…cold. You’re not feigning any more interest in the goings-on that you don’t care for. You’ve stopped tinkering with the AI in the base. You’re slowly caring less and less about how clean your half of the base is.  
Probably the most prevalent “cold” thing about you is that you’re avoiding Grif. You can’t help it, really, you’ve never been good at talking with people. Your plan was to avoid him indefinitely, thus burying any and all ideas he might have gotten from that one stupid moment in the car.

Avoiding Grif is not easy, however. Being in such close quarters all the time, combined with the fact that you two have built your routines around each other, means that avoiding Grif is about as easy as saying no to Sarge. It’s nearly impossible to do when he’s not asleep. You manage only to avoid dusk conversations with him.  
Well, usually you manage avoiding dusk conversations with him. When someone flat-out asks you to come sit with them on the wall, it’s really rude to walk away from that. It’s common etiquette!

“Why are you avoiding me?” Grif asks once you’ve settled in beside him. Just like him to leap right into the conversation you never wanted to have.

“I’m not avoiding you.” You lie.

“Bullshit. You’ve barely spoken to me outside of work in days. Is it because of-” he starts, and you forcibly clamp a hand over his mouth.

“Don’t say that out loud! Donut could be anywhere!” you hiss. Grif actually starts laughing under your hand. When you don’t move, he licks you. It’s gross, and it sends you a good two feet in the opposite direction.

“Cmon, Simmons, lighten up! I haven’t told Donut, and I’m not planning to.”

“Better fucking not.”

“Seriously, though. Why are you avoiding me?” fuck. Grif looks serious. You aren’t going to weasel out of this. It’s finally time to be an adult.

“Once again, I’m not.” You are bad at being an adult.

“Richard.” The tone of voice is practically sinister, and you nearly shiver upon hearing it.

“Dexter.”

“Be serious, dude. Look, I get it, you aren’t ready to come clean about your feelings or whatever. It’s cool, but you don’t have to treat me like the plague.”

“What?” you squeak out. Does Grif seriously think you’re-oh no. “No no, you’ve got it all wrong, I’m not-“

“Simmons, calm down.”

“I’m not!” You practically scream. It’s too high pitched to be convincing, you realize too late.

“Deny it all you like, Dick. Donut’s gaydar has not failed once. If it helps, nobody here is going to judge you for it-” this is not happening. This is not happening. Grif is not telling you this. Grif is not trying to persuade you to come out. You don’t need to come out. You aren’t in the closet. Fuck, you knew this was going to happen. You knew he was going to get confused by the kiss. Why did you do it? Why did you put this on yourself?

“Grif, I am not gay. Really. Believe me, not Donut.”

“If you weren’t, why did you-” he begins to taunt. You want to slap him.

“It was a mistake. Just a mistake. Don’t read more into it.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m serious. I’m sorry if you believe that it meant something more, but no, it didn’t. I’m not listening to any more of this.” You snap, getting up to your feet. When you stand up, you feel him clasp a hand around your wrist.

“Let go.”

“Sit down.”

“Let me go.”

“Simmons, please-”

“Let. Go.” You practically growl. He loosens his grip. You pull your arm free. You’re very cold, you decide, as you start to walk away.

“Sorry.” You swear you hear him say behind you. It makes you pause for a moment.

“What?”

“Nothing. Go on, I bet you have some great fucking sulking around to do. Go on, go cry yourself to sleep like you usually do.” He spits, his eyes firmly locked on the horizon. A long time ago, you would push down all the thoughts about how he looked in the sunlight. Now, you can’t hold them down. There’s too much swimming through your head all at once. You deny, you deny, but you can’t deny how much you would like to punch him in the face.

“Fuck you.”

“What?”

“I said fuck you.”

“Is that a threat?”

“If you got off your fat ass for five seconds yeah, it would be. Fuck you, Grif.” You spit through angry snarls. For the third time in your life, you lift your middle finger at someone. Grif takes offense and practically leaps up. It’s the fastest you’ve ever seen him move.

“You trying to start something, asshole?” Grif walks into your personal space. He’s shorter than you, but he doesn’t really seem to care. He gets right up into your bubble. You can smell his nasty breath. You can count the amount of unshaved whiskers that are popping up on his lazy face. You could count them, if you wanted.

You opt to slap them. You slap right on his jaw. He whirls for a moment, but recovers quickly. He pushes you back, walking forward to push you again. He keeps pushing you and pushing you, until he’s just running you backwards. Your feet struggle to keep up with how fast you’re being moved backwards.

“For fucking months I’ve put up with your shit-” he starts, and you don’t catch all the insults he’s muttering under his breath. You didn’t think your plan all the way through, you realize, as Grif actually gets you pinned against a raised point of the outer wall. He’s smart enough to hold your arms down at your sides, and his grip is firm enough where even while you struggle, you can’t wiggle out. You’re vaguely aware you’re drawing a crowd. You’re a bit surprised you’re more afraid of the base watching this exchange than you are of the exchange itself, considering you’re pinned against a wall and being flat out insulted.

“So, what exactly was your fucking plan here, huh? Cmon Simmons, you’re so very smart, how are you going to get out of this one, huh? Tell me, cmon.” Grif snaps, his face right in front of yours. He’s so close he’s starting to become unfocused by your eyes. You glance toward the gathering crowd of people. “Nobody is helping you out of this. You can’t depend on anyone to bail you out here. Cmon, you’re the so-called genius, what are you going to-”  
You do the only thing you really can. It catches him off guard. You can hear the reaction from below. You’re never going to live this down, you know it. He loosens his grip on your arms, moving to circle around your waist. You shift your position, angling so the crowd below can only really see Grif’s backside. You pull your hands up to his chest, clutching at his shoulders. For a moment, you consider just begging for forgiveness and letting this whole thing go.  
Instead, you push as hard as you can. Grif is off balance almost immediately. Since his arms were looped around your waist, you hit the ground hard. However, you had pulled him into an angle. You accidentally pushed a bit too hard in the wrong direction. You reach out as soon as you realize your mistake, in an attempt to grab him and pull him back up on the wall.

You grab his hand. You can’t support his weight as it falls. Your body forces you to let go, the snap of your arm numbing up to your left shoulder.

Grif falls off the wall.


	11. I can't believe Grif is fucking dead

“Mind explaining to me how in sam hell this happened, son?” Sarge is uncharacteristically calm about the fact that Grif is now in the medical ward and you have spent the last half hour doing nothing but freaking out. Sarge is the first person to actually try talking to you, apart from a minor exchange with Donut after it first happened. You can feel everyone’s questioning eyes on you, but you’ve buried yourself under your armor. You refuse to pull your helmet back off. You refuse to do anything.  
You can’t refuse Sarge, though.

“Sir, it wasn’t supposed to-I didn’t mean-”

“Simmons, calm down. What happened?” he’s asking so calmly. You’ve never heard him be this calm about anything. You know he’s doing it to try and be helpful, but it isn’t helping. You need him to be that tough guy he always is. You need someone to bark an order at you right now.

Bark an order to calm down. Bark an order to not cry.

“Simmons?” he asks, again in that quiet voice.

“I-I-I…” you choke out. You can’t say any more. You don’t know how to explain it. You sure as hell don’t know how to own up to it.  
You don’t mean to, but you make everything awkward all at once. You start wailing. Your helmet is on, but you bury your head in your hands anyway. It does nothing but smoosh your helmet into your face, which actually muffles you in a semi-painful way.  
Sarge backs up a little bit. For a moment, you swear you see Tucker back up into Wash’s arm, but your eyes aren’t exactly the most dependable at the moment.

“I didn’t mean to kill him!” You wail, lifting your head out of your hands momentarily.

“What? Grif’s not dead, he’s just unconscious!” Donut says.

“Another wasted opportunity.” Sarge mutters to himself. It’s loud enough where everyone can hear it, though.

“Just tell us, what happened?” Tex demands. You can’t trust yourself, but you swear she sounds almost amused by this whole thing.

“Yeah, seriously, one moment you two are screaming, the next you’re kissing, and the next you’re attempting murder? What the fuck, dude?” Tucker supplies in his usual Tucker way.

“Wait, what was that about the-” Sarge tries asking.

“Aw man, it’s all the stupid car’s fault!” You snap, muffled once again by your face in the helmet. “If we hadn’t stolen that car none of this would have happened!”

“You can’t really blame a stolen car for attempted murder, Simmons.” Donut says. A few other people nod. They just don’t get it. They don’t understand. It was the car. Without the car, you wouldn’t have kissed him in the first place, you wouldn’t have brought the mercenary here, you wouldn’t have blown up the jeep, you wouldn’t have killed Grif-

“Simmons, what the fuck are you saying? Are you having a stroke?” Church asks, and you just realized you’ve been mumbling out an attempted explanation.

“Simmons is having a stroke?” Doc asks, poking his head out from behind the medical curtain.

“We can’t really tell. Babbling and not making any sense is a sign of a stroke, yeah?”

“Yes?”

“Maybe you should check him. I think knowing that Grif isn’t dead has popped a screw loose!” Sarge suggests. You want to protest, but Doc is dragging you into the back room before you can get a word out. You’re actually very thankful to be out and away from all the others for a bit. You’re not as thankful to have Doc pull off your helmet and see what a mess you are right now.

“You’re not actually having a stroke, are you?” Doc asks.

“I don’t know where they got the idea I was.”

“Are you okay, Simmons?” he asks very quietly. You really hate the quiet voices everyone is sporting around you. It doesn’t help you feel better about almost killing Grif.

“Is he okay?” You ask instead. Doc walks over to where he has Grif lying out on a stretcher. You follow him.

“He’s fine, he just took a hit. He isn’t concussed, thank goodness. No broken bones or anything, either. He’s quite lucky, I suppose. He should come round by tomorrow morning.” You are perplexed there isn’t more damage to him. You are actually shocked that he’s for the most part okay.

“How the fuck did he manage not to break anything?”

“Guess he’s just tougher than he looks. Listen, Simmons, I need someone to stay here and watch him, and I’m guessing you don’t want to go back outside. Fancy staying here overnight?”

“I guess. I wasn’t going to get much sleep anyway.” Simmons, you shrug with the weight of the truth on your shoulders. You’re exhausted, but you owe it to Grif to stay here for him. Doc pats you on your armored shoulder, walking out.

“Everyone leave, there’s nothing more to ask him.”

“What? He didn’t actually have a stroke!” Church said, unbelieving.

“No, silly! He passed out!” You actually stifle a chuckle at Doc’s blatant lie.

“Passed out?” Donut asks.

“Couldn’t handle so much stress, I guess.”

“Should someone look after them?” Wash asks.

“I’ll pop in to check on them every once in a while, but they should be okay. For now, everyone can just go to bed.” Doc suggests, and you can practically hear the “shoo, shoo” in his voice. People leave, you can hear their muttering and footsteps as they go. You make a mental note to thank Doc for this later.

You spend a while watching Grif. You feel creepy, just sitting here and staring at him while he’s unconscious. However, at the same time, you take this time to really evaluate tonight’s actions.  
Forty minutes in to your little self-discovery train of thought, you realize Donut might be right. You immediately banish that thought to the parts of your brain where thoughts go to die.  
You bring the thought back, though, after another fifteen minutes. So maybe you were a little less straight then you thought? Grif doesn’t seem to care, so does it really matter?  
Fuck. You did not just think that. You did not just think that. This is not your life right now.

“Ow…” Grif whines. You pull yourself from your train of thought and turn your attention to him.

“You’re awake!”

“Yeah, no thanks to you-” he starts, but you don’t care to listen to him be angry at you. Nobody is around to see you practically throw yourself over him like a blanket, thank goodness. Grif is confused as fuck.

“Wait-what happened?” Grif asks, rubbing his head with his hand. You pull back to sit up.

“I accidentally pushed you off the wall. God damn, I’m so sorry-” you’re starting to cry again. Your helmet is on the other side of the room, there’s no way you can just run over and grab it without him noticing-

“Simmons? Are you okay?” He asks. He’s also doing the fucking quiet voice. Goddamn.

“No, don’t do that-”

“Do what?”

“Don’t be nice to me. I could’ve killed you, and you’re asking me if I’m okay, don’t do that you fucking asshole-”

“Are you, though?” He asks again. He’s speaking so softly, and you can feel his arms move to comfort you, fuck fuck fuck fuck.

“No.” You admit. “No, I’m not okay. I don’t think I’ve been okay for a while.” You try your best not to sob it out, but you’re so emotional tonight. You allow this moment of weakness. You allow yourself to clutch at Grif and hide your face in his shirt. You allow yourself to clutch at the strongest thing in the room, and you’re just waiting for him to push you off, waiting for him to say no, you don’t get this, you don’t get to need him after you pushed him away.

He tightens his arms around you.

The fucker actually fucking hugs you. The fucker actually has the audacity to whisper a shush and rub his face against yours. You feel him kiss the top of your head and your only thought is “how dare he”.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry-” you start murmuring into his chest. He gently tugs you up by the shoulders to look at you.

“Yeah, you should be sorry, throwing me off the wall like that. But I’m okay, really, no harm no foul.” He grins as he says it, and you laugh. He chuckles. When the laughter ends, both of you are just smiling tired smiles at each other. You realize just how close you are when you catch him glancing down at your lips.

“Hmm?” You hum, unsure if he’s about to-

“I’m debating kissing you. I always seem to get hurt whenever I try.” Grif chuckles.

“Maybe I’m just bad luck.” You smile. You’re repeating what happened in the car. You’re leaning in slowly. Grif leans away for a little bit, but his head hits the pillow and he grins.

“You’re the worst luck I’ve ever had.” He says before you press your lips together for a third time. It’s the first real kiss you two have, considering it isn’t in a cramped car or against the top wall of the base. It feels nice, since it’s finally not painful. You don’t care if you two aren’t good kissers-you really aren’t, you’ll admit that. It doesn’t set off fireworks in you. It doesn’t clear your mind. It’s actually a little bit wet and kinda gross. You can taste the leftovers of whatever he ate last. It’s not the most pleasant taste, you’ll admit. This isn’t the most pleasant feeling.  
You don’t want to move away, though. It’s just good enough where you don’t want to move away.  
At some point, you break off to breathe. There’s a long silence in the room.

“You’re still a bad kisser.” You tease.

“Just need practice.”

“I’d be down for that.”

“But not now. I’m fucking exhausted because someone pushed me into unconsciousness.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake-”

“I’m not letting it go, no. You have the most interesting track record, by the way. Really set the bar high there.” And just like that, you realize you still have no romantic notions about him. He’s still a dick. He’s still the worst. You still wish you could do better than motherfucking Dexter Grif.

You still get him to scooch over. You still slip in against his side and rest your head on his arm. He whines momentarily that you’re going to cut off his circulation and you realize you still hate him.  
Luckily enough, he hates you too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See? Everyone is okay. No need to worry! Absolutely nothing bad is about to happen, obviously...


	12. banter

“What did I tell you? Sister told me I’d find this, and I thought, “there’s no way”, but just look!” A hushed voice calls to you from the space outside your eyelids. You don’t care who it is, you mentally wish them away. You’re tired.

“Tucker, I’m looking. I’m seeing it too. Is this really that surprising?” Another voice. You recognize it almost immediately as Washington. Wash has a distinct voice. So does Tucker, actually, how did you not catch that Tucker was the one just talking? You’re tied.

“I didn’t say I was surprised.”

“Then why did you drag me-” Wash speaks, starting into his squeaky angry voice.

“Wash, not so loud! Don’t ruin this for me. This is a rare sight, I want to soak it in.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“Yeah dude, it’s almost as rare as seeing you with a smile.”

“I wear full body armor most of the day, of course you aren’t going to see me smile!”

“That doesn’t mean you can’t smile out of armor. What’s with you lately, Wash? You seem really anxious lately.” Tucker gets twice as quiet.

“Anxious? I’m not anxious!” Wash gets twice as loud.

“Wash, shush! Don’t wake them up!” You realize Tucker is talking about you. You and Grif. Both of you. Curled up next to each other. Sleeping. Fuck.

“Why would you think I’m anxious?” Wash asks him after a long pause.

“Wash, I may not have known you for long, but I know you. You are more on edge now than you were a week ago. This is about Felix, isn’t it?” Tucker is so quiet you almost don’t hear him right. Then again, you are really tired.

“He won’t stop talking about CT and Maine around me. He’s trying to wind me up so I accept his deal and take him and the car to get them back.”

“Man, that’s such a dick move.”

“Yeah, well, it’s working. I keep thinking about it.” You wish you were more awake. You can practically feel the sexual tension in the look they are giving each other. You don’t even have your eyes open and you know what look they are sharing.

“You can’t go! That’s literally the shittiest plan you’ve ever had!”

“What if they die, Tucker? What if the other mercenary gets tired of waiting for this one to come back and he kills them off?”

“They won’t die, okay? I promise you, they’ll be okay.” Oh fuck. Oh fuck. You know that tone of voice. That all-too-quiet comforting voice. If they start making out you’re going to get up and tell them to get a room. Hopefully it’ll give them a heart attack.

“You can’t promise that.”

“I guess not. But I can sure as fuck bet on it!”

“Tucker-”

“I swear on Simmons’s virginity that they will be okay.” Fuck you, Tucker. You fight to pretend to stay asleep. It isn’t very hard, you’re still very tired.

“How is that something to swear on?”

“Because it’s sure as hell the most consistent thing in the base.”

“Not for much longer.” Grif mumbles next to you. You really hope your face isn’t going red.

“What the fuck-Grif? You’re awake?”

“Kinda hard not to be when you two are having a gay moment two feet away from me. Fuck off, I’m trying to sleep here.” Grif groans at them. He then rolls toward you, throwing his other arm over your side. You seriously hope your face isn’t red.

“Wait-did you guys bang last night?”

“No, we didn’t.”

“But you’re planning on it?” there’s a momentary silence in the air. Grif sits up to tell Tucker something so you don’t hear it. You hear it anyway.

“I’ve been planning on it since I found the guy, now shut up and leave.” Grif grumbles at him. The shock is too much, you can feel it.

“What?!” You bolt upright, red in the face and confused as all hell. Grif looks surprised that you’re awake. Tucker is laughing. Wash…looks like Wash. “What the fuck Grif?”

“I…”

“You know what. Don’t. I don’t want to hear it.” You say before he can say shit. You get up and move over to the little chair you had pulled up while watching him last night. You’ll deal with this later.

“Whatever.” Grif shrugs it off. Tucker is gasping for air. At least he can find this conversation funny. Wash is trying not to laugh. It’s hard to tell, because he’s good at it, but there’s a specific way he bites his lower lip when he’s holding it in.

“So, what do you two want?” You try to change the subject.

“Oh, we were just-” Wash says, gesturing to the door with his thumb and grabbing Tucker’s arm.

“Kaikaina came in to check on her brother, found you two all cozy, and told anyone who would listen that she found you two sleeping together. We just wanted to see if the rumors true.”

“What? That bitch, I’m gonna-” Grif starts.

“Kidding, dude. She only told me. Something about family honor or some shit.”

“Oh thank god.” Grif breathes a sigh of relief. You don’t know what he’s so worried about, he gives no shits. You, on the other hand, are relieved to hear that nobody else wandered into medical during the night. You give shits.

“Hey, Tucker, is Wash-” Calls Caboose as he tottles in. His face lights up as he sees he has found Washington, but then he looks over at you and Grif and frowns. “Tucker did you separate them?”

“No dude, wasn’t my fault.” Tucker shrugs. You gawk.

“I thought you said Kai only told-” Grif starts.

“Dude, people have legs. Other people can walk in here. You didn’t pick a private spot-”

“What do you need, Caboose?” Wash asks, smiling and cutting off Tucker.

“Miss Texas and Mister Sargent are saying you need to come to the door.”

“What? Why?” Tucker asks. He shifts his weight a little closer to Wash. Fuck, they totally came in here to have a gay moment, didn’t they? You catch Grif giving you a raising of the eyebrows, and you realize you’re never going to look at Tucker and Wash the same way.

“We have a visitor! Multiple visitors!” Caboose says. He probably thinks whoever it is has come to be his friend. Wash looks almost scared, immediately pushing past Caboose to run out to the main gate. Tucker looks back at you and Grif and shrugs, running outside.

“Dad, what’s going on?” You hear junior call out to him.

“Don’t know, but just in case, go and stay in your room until I come tell you it’s safe, okay bud?”

“Okay.” You and Grif have been hurrying to put your armor on-Grif is cussing about it, but he wants to know just as much as everyone else what is happening out there. You walk out to watch Tucker ruffle his child’s hair-you’ve always been a fast changer, after all.

“That’s my little man. Don’t worry, nothing bad is going to happen, I promise!”


	13. Locus

You’re late to the conversation, but you instantly know who has come to the base. It’s obvious in the company they keep-one very small woman, and one very large man. The big man has his arms contorted in a painful-looking way, and the small woman has something very wrong with her ankle.

“There will be no negotiation. You will give me back the mercenary or I will kill these two.” The third person is very tall and very dark-you thought Tucker was black until you saw this guy. He’s actually the color black, you think. He has a very intense gaze, and is holding the woman at gunpoint. The larger man, with the broken arms (yeesh, how long have those been broken? Felix said he broke them before he came, and it’s been quite some time since you took Felix in-that guy must be in agony right now) has some odd mechanism around his neck. You’re not sure what it is.

“Only if you give them over!” Wash is yelling. Tex is walking up with Felix in tow, handcuffed and under her arm. He’s bent at the waist and trying desperately to walk at her speed.

“Tex, what are you-” Sarge asks. Tex slams the button for the door, opening it. The second it’s open, Felix is pulled upright by his hair, a knife splayed over his throat.

“Felix.” The other mercenary hisses. He sounds almost angry to see the guy he came for.

“Locus! Hey honey. You miss me?” Felix coos at him. The other mercenary-Locus-gives him a look of disgust. Felix grins, chirping a “d’aaaw”.

“The merc for the freelancers?” Texas asks Locus.

“Hey what about the ca-” Felix starts, but Tex slices into one of his cheeks. Locus gives the equivalent of a smile, and the sight terrifies you.

“Felix first.” Locus barks. He pulls a little more at the woman he’s holding, and she gives him the nastiest of looks. He doesn’t even care. Tex mutters something in Felix’s ear that has him chuckling, and cuts into his other cheek before pushing him forward so fast he falls to the ground. She does not take the handcuffs off, nor does she let Felix walk alone. He walks with the shadow of her hovering over his shoulder the entire time.  
Tex and Locus stare each other right in the eyes. She gives Felix a nudge toward Locus. Locus throws the small woman at Texas. The woman can’t handle being thrown with her bad ankle, it gives out under her and Tex has to sacrifice being able to react at a moment’s notice to catch her without stabbing her.

Locus pulls a button out of a spot in his sleek armor.

He grabs Felix and yanks him to his side.

Clicks it.

There’s an odd noise. The device around the big guy’s neck whirrs, a light coming on.

The light clicks off. The sound is something out of a horror movie. Some grotesque machine whirr sounds as a large rod sticking out from one end suddenly vanishes through the flesh of his neck.

The big guy’s throat starts gushing blood. He falls to the ground almost instantly. Wash screams, getting down from the wall faster than humanly possible, running over to him.

Felix gets thrown over his shoulder as Locus books it. You swear you hear Felix laughing.

The small woman scurries off of Tex, rushing over to where the giant is turning the ground into a bloody puddle. Tex says something you don’t quite catch from all the way over here, and suddenly the three of them are adjusting positions. Tex is hoisting him up by the middle, the small woman has both his massive legs swung over her shoulders, and Wash is holding up his shoulders. The giant’s head rests on his shoulder, causing blood to drip over Wash’s armor, but Wash doesn’t seem to really care.  
Everyone moves out of the way while the three freelancers carry their friend all the way to medical. Doc sprints after them. Tucker starts to move, but Church catches his arm and shakes his head. Tucker looks crestfallen. Even the ever-cheerful Caboose looks confused and worried. He sidles up to Church, and you know there’s something deeply wrong with the situation when Church curls an arm around the blue soldier’s waist instead of pushing him away.

“I’m just…going to go make sure Junior’s okay.” Tucker sighs. He walks away, the familiar swish of his hips lost in the slump of his shoulders. The red team all shares a look, none of you quite sure what to do with this bloody happening.

“Well men, back to work!” Sarge barks after a moment of silence. “I let you and Grif slack off this morning, but dammit if I allow a stranger’s death to stop the goings-on of this here base! Get to it!” He barks at you. You salute, and walk off to the red side of the base. Grif and Donut follow.

“What are we supposed to do now?” you hear Caboose ask Church.

“I…don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It begins


	14. the prodigal son

“Have you two seen Junior?” Tucker asks randomly that evening. Things are tense, as the big guy-Maine-is still critical. Everyone is agitated and scared. You are too, but fuck it it’s dinnertime and you aren’t going to starve yourself over a person you don’t know. 

“Didn’t you send him to his room?” You ask.

“Yeah, but he isn’t there. I’ve checked all of the blue side, the bathrooms, the showers, the vehicle bay-”

“Have you checked the red side? He might have wandered over here in all the commotion-”

“Checking now. Holler if you see him, please!” Tucker says cheerfully, but you can tell he’s panicking. You swallow another bite as Grif sits down with another drink of chocolate milk. The middle of the goddamn zombie apocalypse and this asshole is drinking a fourth glass of chocolate milk. Weren’t people supposed to be starving in the zombie apocalypse? Parched? Fighting every single day just to survive? Ah fuck it, chocolate milk is delicious, you don’t care. You steal a sip of it and laugh when he protests.

“What’s up with Tucker?” he asks through a milk mustache.

“Can’t find his kid.”

“Junior is still missing? Man, I knew that kid was shy, but he loves his dad, he wouldn’t hide this long, would he?” Grif asks. The question raises many more questions. It is curious that Junior hasn’t come out from wherever he’s hiding yet. You wonder if he’s okay.

“Your half of the base is so disgusting.” Tucker spits as he comes back.

“It’s Grif’s fault.” You say. Grif nods.

“Dude, fuck this. Simmons, you fixed the base communication thing, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, but why-”

“Maybe if I use it I can get him to come the fuck out.”

“Ah, sí. Otro gay. Gay engendra gay. Necesitábamos más gente gay por aquí.” Lopez replies bitterly at him. Tucker frowns, but only at the tone of voice. You know he has no idea what Lopez is saying. “Si ayuda , vi a su hijo humana cerca de la entrada trasera. Pero no me vas a entender de todos modos, para que usted y su esperma utilizado follar.”

“Lopez, that’s not helping.”

“Fine. No hagas caso a decirme exactamente dónde coño su hijo era . A ver si me follando cuidado.” Lopez huffs, walking off. Fuck you too, you Spanish piece of shit.

“Seriously, can I use the fucking loudspeaker?” Tucker asks you again. You get up to help him use it when a piercing cry runs throughout the base.  
You, Grif, and Tucker aren’t the only ones who react to the sound of screaming. The denizens of the base all stop what they are doing immediately to witness CT screaming.  
She doesn’t say words. She yells a groan of frustration and anger. She’s screaming and kicking at nearby objects, and throws a knife and buries it into a wooden plank. She kicks a box with her bad ankle, the scream dies for a moment to make way for loud cursing.

“Connie, don’t-”

“Fuck off, I’m fine. Just need to cope with this the Dakota way.”

“Connie-”

“Don’t “Connie” me, Wash. Don’t you fucking “Connie” me.”

“Connie, you aren’t responsible for-”

“Not responsible? How exactly am I not responsible? “Oh, don’t worry Carolina, this is a fairly safe city, I’ll be just fine! Fuck, I’ll take Wash with me, the two of us can handle it!” Well guess what? We didn’t handle it, we fucked up, and all of it is on me, so don’t you come telling me I’m not responsible for-” CT, the small woman, makes fun of her own self. She screams, she makes noise, but she isn’t mad at Washington. She might as well be yelling at a mirror. She is mad at herself. She turns and jabs two fingers into Wash’s chest, using her prods and pokes to enunciate her words.

“So we made a mistake!” Wash cuts her off, grabbing her hand. “It’s alright, we all-”

“Don’t say we all make mistakes, Wash. We don’t. Some of us very specifically make mistakes while others don’t seem to make any. That’s why she didn’t want us to go on our own, Wash! That’s why she sent Maine after us when we missed the rendezvous! Because we are the ones that make all the mistakes!” CT is quieter, but not exactly quiet. She walks around while she talks with her hands, as if she can’t contain her emotions in just her expression. Wash looks almost guilty. You don’t understand why he looks guilty. You don’t really get what’s happening here.

“If he never speaks again, it’s on me.” CT says. It’s soft, almost like a whisper. Wash’s face switches into an alarmed expression, and he steps forward, saying her name again, but she walks away, shoving past him as she goes.

“What’s up with her?” Tex asks, stepping up to be the guinea pig from the crowd.

“She’s always been like this. But now, with Maine…”

“How is the big guy?” Tex asks, as soft as someone made of sandpaper can manage.

“Not good. It’ll be a miracle if we can pull him out of this. Whatever that device was that Locus created, it was designed to do lots of damage. Maine’s lucky it missed his spine.” Wash speaks somberly. It sounds almost as if he is purposefully distancing himself from what is happening with his friend, opting instead to report as if a soldier on duty. You used to envy the way the freelancers were organized. Now, you’re not so sure you do.

“Look, Tex, Doc’s a…good medic, and all, but there’s no way he can do this alone. You wouldn’t happen to know another medic, would you?”

“As a matter of fact…” Tex starts. She doesn’t finish, she walks away. Wash follows her. You and Grif exchange a look, and Grif nods slightly. The two of you get up to follow her.

“Go on without me. I’m gonna keep looking for Junior.” Tucker says, walking off the opposite way you and Grif do. He looks pretty frazzled.  
Tex and Washington march all the way to the vehicle bay before they stop. Tex and Sheila are in the middle of a conversation when you and Grif finally catch up, hanging back just enough where you won’t bother the two state-names.

“Why do you still have yours? I thought Carolina made you-”

“She could never tell me what to do.” Tex coldly says. You shiver in fear at the tone.

“Well, this certainly helps a little. Trouble is, none of the others are medics. You know that.”

“I’ve been using that radio to keep tabs on you guys for months now. Try York.”

“York? He isn’t anything close to a-”

“York is travelling with a schoolteacher and a surgeon.”

“A surgeon, eh? How’d he find someone like that?”

“Doesn’t matter. What matters is that you bring them here.”

“York isn’t on good terms with the rest of the team right now, you know.”

“After what he pulled, I’m not surprised. However, he’s still a freelancer, he won’t turn Maine down.” Tex gives Sheila a pat on the armored hull, turning to leave. “Oh, and Wash?”

“Yes, Tex?”

“Don’t let Carolina know about me. As far as she’s concerned, you found your old radio or something.” Tex hisses. The bitch in black walks out of the bay, slamming the doors behind her.

“What was all that about?” Grif asks the moment she’s gone. Wash turns toward you two. In his hands is a small walkie-talkie. It’s black and worse for wear, you notice.

“All the freelancers carry a radio similar to this one. It’s how we keep tabs on each other. I lost mine a while back, but Tex…kept hers, apparently.” There’s a strange emphasis on the word “kept”. You assume it has a second meaning you don’t understand yet.

“So what’s the big deal? You have a radio now, are you going to summon all your friends or something?” Grif asks in his usual abrasive way. Wash frowns a little.

“I can’t do that. If they find out Tex is still alive…” Wash pauses, wincing ever so slightly. “Let’s just say there would be a lot of issues.”

“What happened with Tex?” You ask. Please Wash, don’t close off, you really want to know what the deal is.

“Let’s just say that Tex and Carolina have a rivalry of sorts, and leave it at that.” Fuck, Wash, cmon, don’t do it like that.

“So you’re calling…who?” You ask, trying to dig anything out of the freckly man. You don’t get a chance to hear anything more out of him, because there’s a loud piercing noise throughout the base.

“Is it working? Oh cool-Hey, has anyone seen Junior around? Please let me know if you have, thanks.” Comes the voice of Tucker through the loudspeaker. It’s cool and collected, but you know Tucker is internally freaking out.

“Junior is missing?” Wash asks you and Grif. His face is full of a sudden panic.

“Tucker told him to hide. We haven’t seen him since.”

“What-we should be looking for him! Why aren’t we all-”

“Because we were all concerned about the guy who just got his throat blown up? Wash, aren’t you supposed to be calling someone about that?” Grif oh-so-gently reminds Wash that a life hangs in the balance here, this isn’t the time to panic about a lost person.

No. A lost child. Junior. Tucker’s lost son.

Grif was totally right about Wash and Tucker. You owe him ten bucks.

“Right, York. Right.” Wash repeats it to himself, convincing himself that he needs to focus on Maine right now. It doesn’t take too long.

“Tell you what, Wash. We’ll go help Tucker find his kid. You make that call and save your dying friend.” Grif says, patting Wash on the shoulder before starting to walk out. You want to help Junior and Tucker, so you go with. Behind you, you hear Wash speaking to whom you assume to be York. What the fuck is with that guy's voice?  
You wish you could listen more.


	15. dads, kinks, and daddy kinks

Sadly, spending the entire rest of the day searching the nearby area for Junior proves fruitless. The kid is nowhere to be found, and by the time you trudge back in the base for the night, you swear Tucker is about to cry. Under his helmet, you hear occasional sniffles.

“You’re back!” Of course it’s Wash that’s waiting for you at the gate when you return. His armor is still on, except for his helmet, which means he probably signed on for the first night watch. He doesn’t even register anyone but Tucker-despite your group of five, including you, Tucker, Grif, Kaikaina, and Donut. Donut claimed that no matter what hole or bush he was looking in he would always find his man. Kai said she wanted to help Tucker find his dog. Tucker reminded her that Junior was a child. Kai didn’t absorb that information. Wash doesn’t care about the rest of you, though. Well, if he does, he doesn’t right now. He’s looking right at Tucker, his face carefully balanced to not look too much like one emotion.

“You didn’t-” Wash starts. His face gets a bit more saddened when he sees Junior is not with you. The “rescue team” all shake their heads. Tucker sniffs again.

“What about you? Get in contact with your freelancer friend?” Donut asks him. You have no idea how Donut knows Wash was even calling. Maybe Grif told him?

“York and his companions are willing to help, but they don’t have a transport. We have to go get them.” Wash answers oh so bluntly. “We’re heading out tomorrow morning.”

“At least traffic will be good.” Donut jokes. None of you feel like laughing. His joke is greeted by a few forced chuckles and a long, tired silence.  
It’s Grif that walks away first, with an explanation of “well, I’m gonna go sleep”. Kai asks you if you’re going with him, and when you say no she just says “sure” in the most creepily sugary way possible. She and Donut giggle to each other before she walks off toward the blue half of the base. Donut skips off after Grif, and you start walking back, much slower.

Behind you, there’s the telltale thud of a helmet hitting the ground. Then the awkward clinking of armor against armor.

You spare a second to turn around and look. Tucker is buried in the armor of Wash’s chest, eyes firmly shut and biting his lips together. Wash is just hugging him, saying nothing. He sees you watching and shoots you a look that you understand entirely.

You turn away. You walk back toward the red half of the base and into the little room you call yours. It’s a bit more personalized than it was when you first got here, but you never really cared for personalization so you just…left it mostly grey and boring. Grif claims it’s like your personality. Sarge likes that you haven’t wasted time with making your room all decorative. Donut hates your room with a burning passion and has tried on multiple occasions to change it without you. It never works.

You put your armor in a little crate you found lying around the base. It was filled with Grif’s junk at one point. Now it is a nice little tool for organizing. You’re halfway out of your undersuit when your door opens. You automatically assume it’s Donut, because he has no concept of privacy.  
Actually, it’s Sarge.

“So, did you find-” he starts, cutting off for a second because-well, it’s his own damn fault here. Bad timing is bad timing. Fuck, this reminds you of an episode of Star Trek. Or a bad porn. Or both.

“We didn’t find Junior, sir.” You answer right after frantically tugging your undersuit back on. Sarge, decked entirely in armor, waits patiently for you to get decent again before continuing.

“How’s Tucker?” what? How’s Tucker? Sarge knows that’s a blue, right?

“Tucker? He’s…not too good, but holding himself toge-” and you don’t even get to finish before Sarge marches off. You lean out the doorway to look after him as he just leaves the red barracks.

“Where’s he off to?” Grif asks from behind you, probably doing the same thing you are. Actually, yeah, he is doing the exact same thing you are, you realize as you turn around to talk to him.

“Apparently to check on Tucker.”

“Oh. Okay.” Shrugs Grif, moving back into his own room. You forget the fact you are wearing a skintight bodysuit for a second and move the two feet required of you to stand in his (still open) doorway.

“Don’t you find that weird? That Sarge is checking on Tucker? He hates the blues!”

“You honestly believe that? Dude, Sarge hates the blues as much as…” Grif trails off. Lounging in a stolen swivel chair, Grif removes his face from an old comic book long enough to look up at you and lose all thought or something. You’re a bit flattered, a bit disturbed, and mostly feel the need to run back and put something else on. Just because this thing isn’t revealing doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel…revealing.

“As much as?” you prompt.

“Why are you still in-”

“Grif.” You cut him off. This is a serious night, tomorrow will be a serious day, and-

“Wow, Simmons! I didn’t expect you to be into that!” goddamn it Donut, someone’s kid is missing and someone else is dying and you being in a full bodysuit is what matters right now?

“Shut up, Donut! This isn’t a sex thing!” You yell to Donut, who’s standing right outside his own door, next to Grif’s. Why the fuck isn’t he wearing a shirt. Why the fuck isn’t he wearing shorts that cover his ass. Why the fuck is he smirking so widely.

“Hey, no judgements.” Donut shrugs.

“Yeah dude, there’s loads of weird shit out there, this is pretty tame-” Grif starts. You glare at him. He doesn’t even look sorry.

“Guys. Tucker’s kid is missing. Maine is dying. We don’t have time for this bullshit.”

“Oh Simmons, lighten up! No need to spend every minute with a stick up your ass.”

“Yeah, Dick. And besides, we can’t do anything about the situation until tomorrow. Relax a little, won’t you?” leave it to your English-speaking teammates to gang up on you like this.

“Wait-were you just trying to get out of the sex thing? Because seriously, if you’re worried about this, I should tell you some of the stuff I’m into, because it’s way worse!” Donut cheerily informs you. To avoid listening to him talk any more about his sex life, you step into Grif’s room and shut the door.

“That’s only going to make him think we’re doing it more.” Grif tells you.

“Better that than…you know.”

“Hey, I’ve sat through his kink list before. It’s long, sure, but it’s actually pretty interesting!” Grif tells you. You open the door and push past the Donut who had his semi-naked frame pressed against it, listening to the two of you. They are both gross.

“Oh come on, you got all dressed up already, don’t feel you can’t go through on my account!” Donut says, and you’re unsure how he isn’t laughing. You know how you aren’t, however, as you push past him and go to your own room.

When you were younger, your dad believed that a locked door meant that something horrible or illegal was happening in the room. He wanted to be able to enter your room at any second of any day, so you’d get in big trouble if your door was ever locked. Here, in the military base, locking your door is essential. For instance, it keeps the pests from entering in after you. It keeps Donut from talking more about sex and from Grif asking if he gets to watch you undress. Well actually no, it doesn’t stop that at all, but it muffles it and keeps them from saying that inside your room.  
They give up after about five minutes of silence from you. You change into normal sleepwear (not Donut’s definition of normal) and prepare for sleep.  
Sleep, however, evades you. You’re thinking too hard about possibilities of where Junior went and what’s going to happen in the future once freelancers other than Wash come to the base and-

Okay, you’ll admit it in the darkness surrounding you. You think about Grif a little bit. You’re allowed to, right? You’ve already kissed the guy, it’s okay if you…think about him…  
You feel the need to say you aren’t thinking about him in…that way. No no, you aren’t thinking about him sexually at all. You don’t think about him like that. You don’t think about how nice it would be to have him kiss you, how nice those warm and fat hands of his would feel caressing your skin, how nice it would be to slip your legs around his lap again and just sorta grind your hips against his, sloppily kissing him through moans, heated and-

Yuck. No. Grif is gross and you refuse to think about that any more than you have to. At least, not until he takes a shower. You will never have sex with someone who considers dorito breath a semi-perfume.

The night is long. You think a lot. You think too much. You think too much on what you said you wouldn’t think about.

Guess what, Simmons? For the first time in twelve months, you think about something that actually arouses you. Nice job. It’s been a while since you really gave yourself the luxury of feeling anything but existential terror. But hey, the base is safe, the night is quiet, and it has been a long time since you have even so much as looked at your own genitals. You take a moment and lean back against your bedroom wall, contemplating. It is a little late for this sort of thing, isn’t it?

You opt instead to roll over. You roll onto your stomach and put your hands behind your back and you are not going to do this tonight, it’s late and you should be asleep already. Thoughts creep into your mind and you refuse to act on them.

Though you have to admit, your mattress has a nice feeling to it-

No. That’s it. You aren’t doing this tonight. Fuck it, you’re getting up and taking a quick shower. Nice and cold and deadly to all thoughts you shouldn’t be having. Yes.

On your way back, you swear you hear the sound of feet scurrying away and the slight thud of a door closing softly. You think nothing of it, probably just someone going for a midnight snack-looking at you, Dexter Grif. You finally retire, popping your fake leg back off and curling up under a shitty blanket.

At some point, you trick yourself into actually falling asleep. Or maybe the entire night is just you lying there, deep in thought. When you wake up, you don’t feel entirely awake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I just wanted you to all know, I...may not be updating quite as often from now on. My summer job, which was supposed to be part-time, decided it wanted me to work nearly full-time, and I usually like to be two chapters ahead before I post a new chapter...but the problem is, for once, you guys are caught up to me because I haven't had time to WRITE the next two chapters yet! I'm sorry for any waiting, please know that this fic is not on hiatus and is not going to stop any time soon!


	16. Teenagers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey you remember all those character I had tagged at the beginning of this fic? All those characters I had tagged that had you confused as to why they were tagged because they weren't in the story yet? Buckle up, folks, the next few chapters are going to introduce more characters than you are expecting!

“You’re leaving already?”

The question Tucker asks Wash is much louder than he probably wants it to be, considering it carries from where the two of them stand all the way over to where you sit on the wall-like you do every morning, thank you.

“Sun’s up already.”

“Dude, it’s five am.”

“Time is irrelevant when someone is-wait a second. How the fuck do you know what time it is?”

“Helmet clock?”

“No, Tucker, it’s the zombie apocalypse, and you have a working clock?”

“I don’t know, Simmons fixed it. Blame him if it’s the wrong time or some shit. Why, doesn’t yours work?” There’s a pause. You don’t yell over that Wash never gave you his helmet to fix. You also don’t yell over that Lopez was the one who probably actually fixed it. You’re good with technology, but Lopez is great with it.

“Anyway, yes. I’m leaving as soon as CT gets here.”

“Isn’t she still injured? Should she really be doing this?”

“It’s a car ride, she’ll be fine. Besides, if I didn’t, she’d just hobble after me anyway.”

“Fucking rude.” CT yells, as she does indeed hobble over towards him. She isn’t doing too bad, all things considered. She greets Wash with a punch to the shoulder and something you can’t hear. She smiles at Tucker, gets in the car, and now it’s Wash who is the one holding them back.

“Be careful out there, okay?” Wash tells Tucker. Tucker nods, saying nothing, and steps back. Fuck, you owe Grif so much bet money.

“Hope you find your kid, dude!” CT says as Wash starts up Felix’s car. Wash drives up to the gate, then has to stop because the gate isn’t left open and somebody has to open it the fuck up. The more pressing question of why the blues lugged the car out of the vehicle bay and out into the main courtyard will probably never be answered.

Now it’s just you and Tucker. Both of you, awake before you need to be and awake before everyone else.

“Hey, Tucker! Come on up for a bit!” You call down.

“Dude, are you kidding? You heard Wash, sun’s up, let’s get going!”

“Tucker, nobody else is going to get moving at five in the goddamn morning. Come sit, dude, Junior will be fine.” You sure as fuck hope Junior is fine as Tucker thinks on your offer for a moment and begrudgingly sits beside you on the wall.

“So…other than your son getting kidnapped and your boyfriend leaving camp to find a medic, how are you?” You ask him. You aren’t good at conversations, sometimes.

“Woah woah wait-boyfriend? Fuck you dude, Wash and I are not dating!”

“You sure as fuck seem to be!”

“Gross, dude, I am not gay. I am into ladies. LADIES.” He reiterates at the sarcastic nodding of your head. “Whatever, like you have better taste.”

“You admit it then?”

“Only if you admit that you and Grif are married.”

“We aren’t married.”

“Sure you are. You act married. If it looks like a duck and bickers like a duck, it’s a duck.”

“Forget I said anything about it.”

“Someone’s being defensive.”

“We are two grown-ass men, don’t tell me the only thing you want to talk about is relationship status. You are such a teenage girl sometimes, jesus.” You laugh, more to mask the fact that you brought up this topic than finding Tucker funny.

“Well it’s not like I know that much about you, despite what Grif has told me.”

“Grif talks about me?”

“Doesn’t shut up about you.” Tucker shrugs. You blink twice.

“What does he-”

“Now who’s the teenage girl?” Tucker laughs, despite deliberately setting you up for this one. You scoff at him. He’s the teenage girl here, not you.

It’s actually really easy to talk to Tucker. He’s open about most everything, and while he does tease, he never really tries to be cruel. He’s just shooting the breeze, for the most part. It’s oddly comforting. You can see why Grif works hard to stay this guy’s friend.  
Of course, it all ends when you mention Junior. It’s an offhand statement, maybe, but it strikes a chord with the father of the missing child and he deflates almost instantly.

“Hey, if you want, we can go get everyone else up. Early start means we’ll find him faster, right?” You suggest through a forced smile. Your eyebrows won’t cooperate, though, and you know you look more nervous than comforting.

“Yeah, I guess so. I’ll go wake up Church and Tex, you get…whoever is coming from the red side.” Tucker waves his hand as he gets up. He tries to be casual, but as soon as his feet hit the ground he’s sprinting. Guy must really love his kid.

You settle for the easy way of waking up the red side of the base. Sarge, for reasons you still don’t quite get, set up a large speaker system through the red base and rigged it to blast loud music. He wanted to use it for that…one army tune that wakes up the soldiers, but all he had on hand was some weird Spanish polka CD from Lopez. It got so annoying so quickly that he stopped using it as a wake-up long before you got there, but you know exactly where it is.  
More importantly, you know how to turn it on.  
The result is instantaneous and angry screaming. The loudest of which, surprisingly, comes from the high screech of Donut’s voice. Guess he hates polka.

“Turn it off! For the love of all that’s holy turn it off!” Grif starts crying, running out with his hands desperately clutching his ears. Full-body robe and slippers, huh. Not what you were expecting him to sleep in, to be honest.

“By the saint George Washington! Shut off that racket!” Sarge barks. That probably sounded much better in his head. Or maybe he was actually asleep and therefore did not have a good “southernism” planned.  
Lopez is smiling. He is staring directly at the screaming members of the red team and he is smiling. You take that as the bad omen it is, and you shut off the music. Lopez stops smiling as the team lets out a sigh of relief, even you, because seeing Lopez like that has left you scarred.

“Simmons! What in sam hell did you do that for, son?” Sarge yells as you walk out to join them. He’s still in armor for some reason. Does he ever remove it?

“Tucker wants to get the search party started.”

“Dude, it’s like six in the goddamn morning. I have never willingly gotten up before ten before, so go tell Tucker to take himself, and fuck himself, with himself.” Grif grumbles.

“Alright, let’s get moving! Why didn’t you say so sooner, Simmons? We should be on the road already! Get suited up, boys, we are finding ourselves a child!” Sarge immediately becomes more chipper when he realizes it will cause Grif pain. Grif groans. Donut groans. Lopez semi-smirks, but is still scowling. Quite the facial expression, really.

Tucker is making his own kind of facial expression when the party gets together. You realize it’s because Tex has decided that too many people are leaving the base and that she needs to stay there to keep it safe, even if not everyone is going. You realize even more it’s because Caboose is coming along, because Caboose is screaming about fields and Tucker looks about ready to pull his hair out.

You’re in the business district of the city when he actually does pop his helmet off to tug at his hair, but it isn’t because of Caboose. It’s already two in the afternoon, you’ve covered over half of the city, and there is still no sign of Tucker’s son. Tucker has his fingers grabbing at his dreads, yanking on them while he grunts angrily through clenched teeth.

“Tucker, maybe you should take a-” You start to suggest.

“No breaks! My kid could be dead or dying and you want me to sit down even more and wait? I’ve already done too much waiting around, he’s probably dead because of me-” Tucker starts spewing his own paranoia and it becomes more about him yelling at himself than about him yelling at you. Grif moves to comfort him.  
Something else moves, too. You catch the noise of running feet and a streak of teal-aqua?-ducking into an alley. Church, who is standing nearby, catches it too. You both raise your guns and walk toward the alley, and when you get to the entrance, you press your backs to the wall.

“Ready? On three. One, two-”

“Wait, on three, or three and then go?”

“On three. It’s always faster on three. One, two-” You jump first, gun raised and finger right on the trigger. “Three!” Church joins you a good moment later.

“You went on two, you asshole.”

“No, I went on three!”

“You said three after you jumped!” Church turns forty-five degrees to start yelling at you, and you struggle to keep yourself facing forward and not giving in to turning and yelling. Today has been nothing but stress, and you feel like yelling too, but this isn’t the time.  
When Church realizes you aren’t joining him in letting off steam, he turns back to the alley and raises the sniper rifle he doesn’t really know how to use. Seriously, who lets this guy carry a gun?

“Uh…hi there.” Church says it first. Oh, you should probably mention, at the end of the alley is an absolutely terrified looking teenager. He looks like Tucker, but not enough like Tucker to ask Tucker if he somehow had any other kids. Even wears the same aqua-green?-as Tucker.

“Please don’t kill me.” The kid says, surprisingly clearly and loud enough to hear.

“What? No, we aren’t going to kill you. Fuck, dude, we’re lovers, not fighters.”

“That sounded extremely gay.” You can’t let Church get away with that one.

“Shut up, you know what I meant. What’s your name, kid?”

“Palomo. Charles Palomo.” Wow, this kid is…calm. What the hell, how is he so chill? Give up your secrets, teen, anxiety-ridden Simmons would like to know them.

“Yeah yeah, nice to fucking meet you, whatever. Who the fuck are you, what the fuck are you doing out here, and how the fuck are you still alive without any armor?”

“Who are you guys talking to?” Donut asks, skipping up and slinking an arm around both yours and Church’s shoulders. “Hi there! I’m Donut. You are?”

“About to answer a bunch of fucking questions, until you showed up.” You grumble at Donut, who ignores you.

“I’m Palomo. I’m trying to get back to my group, I lost them after…well, zombies attacked our camp, and we all got separated, and-”

“Kid, we don’t want your life story. We want your how-are-you-alive-without-armor story.” Church stops him from talking. Leave it to Church to shut a conversation down.

“Dumb luck?” Palomo answers. Church doesn’t look happy to hear it. Actually, you’re amazed you know what expression Church is making through his helmet. That must be your dumb luck.

“Look, kid, we don’t have time to play babysitter for you. We are looking for another kid.”

“So am I! Maybe we could help each other, eh?” Palomo gestures between himself and Church a few times, eyebrows raised and waggling. Church doesn’t say anything.

“Well, unless the kid you’re looking for is about ten or so, going by the name Junior, we can’t help you.” You supply. You and Church turn to leave.

“Wait! Junior, you say? I’ve seen some British guy with a kid named Junior!”

“You’ve seen my kid?” Tucker appears out of nowhere, suddenly holding Palomo by the collar and face so frantically close their noses are touching. “Where? Where did you see him? Is he okay? Please tell me he’s okay!”

“Uh…by the train station? About an hour ago? Sir, can you let me go?”

“Kid, you’re coming with us. Help me get my kid back, and I’ll help you get back to your group. Deal?” Tucker says as he lets Palomo go. Palomo drops to the ground with a soft thud, and when Tucker extends a hand to him to seal the deal, you swear you see little sparkles in his eyes as he reaches up. Maybe it’s the angle of the sun? Fuck if you know, who would want to glorify Tucker?

“Yes sir…sir! Sorry, what’s your name?” Palomo asks as Tucker hauls him to his feet.

“Lavernius Tucker.” Tucker replies, halfway out of the alley and already marching off toward the train station. Palomo starts running after him, wanting to keep his new idol within sight. You and Church shrug at each other.

“Well, at least we have something to go off of. Honestly, if I have to deal with a miserable Tucker again, I’m going to shoot someone.” Grif gripes as you start after the rest of the group. Fuck whoever designated you two as the last, being at the rear of the group is stupid.

“Shoot yourself, put us all out of our misery.” You tease. Grif swats your arm.

“Seriously though. Who the fuck would want to kidnap Tucker’s genetics anyway?”

“Simmons, how much do you know about Junior?”

“What do you mean?” You ask. Grif puts a hand on your armor, looks ahead to make sure the two of you are out of earshot, and lowers his voice.

“Did anyone ever tell you about his mother?”

“Yeah, she died in childbirth, Tucker hauled Junior out-”

“No no, I mean about who she was before she became pregnant.”

“Um…no.”

“Let’s just say she was…the wife of someone very influential. When her husband heard she was pregnant and it wasn’t his, he flipped out and put a bounty on Tucker’s head.”

“What?”

“We’ve had to deal with bounty hunters from time to time, but none of them ever really succeeded. Obviously, or we wouldn’t be having this little chat.”

“So wait-Tucker fucked some dude’s wife, had a kid with her, and that dude wants Tucker and Junior dead?” You try and wrap your head around this…sudden bit of news. Grif nods.

“Pretty much sums it up.”

“Is there anything else I should know about? Any more bombshells of information?”

“Donut’s gay.”

“Fuck you, I’m being serious.”

“Cmon, we can’t keep lingering like this.” Grif says louder as he starts to walk. “Someone has to cover their asses, dude!”

“I’m so glad Donut isn’t here to-” you start, before you realize you are alone on an empty road. “-wait, why am I talking to myself?” you question, before starting to jog after the somehow-fast-walking Grif. “Grif, wait up!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry it's taken me so long to get back to this! I hope to be more regular with it, now that work has cooled down a little. I still have loads of things I need to get done this summer, so this has to take a back burner for now. Once again, this is NOT going on hiatus and this is NOT stopping.


	17. Wyoming

On foot, the train station is a bitch to walk to. It’s a good four miles between the nearest entrance-well, entrance that wasn’t blown apart or clogged up with objects or worse, zombies-and the business district, so all the group has to tottle along after Sarge and Tucker as they proudly march ahead. Grif is heaving by the time you get there, and Caboose has hoisted Church up on his back for “safekeeping” or something like that. It’s clearly just because Church doesn’t want to walk any more. He never wants to fucking walk, you’ve never seen a grown man ask for so many piggy back rides.

“Well, this place isn’t as I remembered it.” Donut remarks, putting his hands on his hips. “It’s…a bit more…”

“Bloody?” You answer. Donut nods, because you are right. The train station is a lot bloodier than when red team was last here. There are corpses strewn about, holes blasted through their brains. Sarge doesn’t flinch at the mess of blood and entrails everywhere, walking straight forward into the pit of what the rest of the group is afraid to see.

“Come on then! We want to find this kid, we’ve got to prove ourselves as good fathers! Like in that one video game that everyone misquotes!”

“Wait-why are you making that reference?” You ask, a bit perplexed.

“Tucker, you’ve got to be the dad that killer has been waiting for! Otherwise, Junior will drown!” Sarge pauses to let Tucker sink it in. Tucker doesn’t wait, he darts down the stairs and past Sarge. Sarge chuckles, and when he hears a loud squelch of what you hope was not Tucker stepping on an organ, he adds on. “Probably in all this blood. It isn’t exactly raining, you know.”  
You find Tucker by following the sounds of his angry yelling at everything. Jesus, did this guy never learn the meaning of the word sneak? Does he think yelling Junior’s name every five steps is going to help him find his son?  
Fuck, Sarge has you thinking about that stupid heavy rain game.  
Surprisingly, Tucker’s strategy works. In an old bookstore, you find the bounty hunter, sitting atop a misshapen pile of books. A single light dangles from above him, giving the whole room an eerie glow. Your mind is still on old video games, and this looks a bit too much like a scene from something very survival horror, except for one thing-Junior is sitting in his lap as the character reads a passage from Great Expectations. Junior looks unharmed, and actually seems to be a little…happy?

“Junior!” Tucker screams as he bursts in the (soundproof?) bookstore doors. Junior bolts upright, rushing to his feet and moving to run to his father, but the bounty hunter holds him back with one hand. Give Junior some credit, the bounty hunter does have to stand up to do so.

“My my, what have we here?” Goodness gracious this guy is a walking stereotype. He’s tall and lean, standing perfectly upright with his head tilted back just so. His hair is flawless, and on his face he sports a well-groomed mustache. He is way too clean to be in the zombie apocalypse.

“Give me back my son!” Tucker yells.

“Hm. Yes, I can see the resemblance. That means you’re the famous Lavernius, no?”

“What is this, evil-villain monologue hour?” Palomo questions.

“Dude, I have been looking everywhere for my fucking kid. Skip the bullshit, we either duke it out, or you give him back to me and we avoid wasting some ammunition.” Tucker snarls. The bounty hunter hesitates, obviously not expecting Tucker to be so…violent in person, but the stranger doesn’t have long to think on it before Tucker literally throws himself at him. The British man reflexively releases his hold on Junior to protect himself, and Junior takes that moment to scurry over to where the rest of you stand.

“Shouldn’t you help him?” Junior asks.

“Are you kidding? This is amazing! Ten bucks says he ends up with a black eye!” Grif laughs.

“I’ll take those odds. I’m thinking more along the lines of cracked ribs for this one.” Church pipes up, and before they can talk money, Donut chimes in.

“Obviously it’ll be his arms, guys. Two broken arms. Maybe just one if he’s lucky.”

“Will you shut up and help me??” Tucker screams from where he is, somehow helmetless and pinned down by the stranger, who is holding a sniper rifle. Where the rifle was hidden beforehand, you don’t know. You’re not sure you want to know.

“I don’t have time for this tomfoolery.” He replies, pushing the barrel of the sniper rifle against Tucker’s head, looking the rescue team dead in the eyes. “Give me the son.”

There’s a heavy moment in the air. You and Sarge exchange a glance. Donut looks to the floor. Caboose stops swinging his arms back and forth. Palomo and Church both stare blankly at the stranger. None of you want to be the one who gave Junior over, but none of you want Tucker to die.

Thankfully, the moment is ended by the soft ding of a bookstore doorbell.  
“Sorry honey, all I could find was Earl gre-” comes the sweet, singsong voice of another stranger, who stops immediately in the doorway upon witnessing this scene. “Reg-”

“Just a bit of…unfinished business, love.” The British one, Reg, replies. He’s grimacing, his eyebrows giving away the “oh shit” feeling he must have right now. The group doesn’t move as the new stranger reaches up between his dark eyes and rubs the tanned bridge of his nose, his weight sinking into one hip with a sigh.

“Reggie, cmon.” He groans, and the group looks back over to the British man-Reggie, apparently-who gains a shade of red.

“They came barging in here, Butch!”

“Of course they did! That’s the kid’s dad, why wouldn’t he come bursting in to rescue him?” The stranger argues back with Reg, setting a small box down on a nearby bookshelf as he walks across the room. “Golly gee, I am so, so sorry about all thi-wait a second, Tucker? Is that you?”

“Flowers? What the fuck, man? Why are you kidnapping my kid?”

“Kidnapping? N-no, we aren’t-Reggie, why didn’t you tell me this was Tucker’s son?”

“I thought his name was spelled with an F, not a T.” The British man mumbles. The other, Flowers, scoffs very loudly.

“Oh heavens to betsy, Reg, get off of him!” Flowers snaps at Reg, who obliges. Flowers pulls Tucker to his feet, immediately embracing him. Somehow, Tucker has found someone who is just as ridiculously short as he is. “Tucker, it is super to see you alive and in one piece! Oh man has Junior grown since last I saw the little guy-didn’t even recognize him! How’s that old soldier-team of yours doing, huh? I sure miss them!”

“We’re standing right fucking here, dude.” Grif chimes in. Flowers reels around with wide eyes and a grin that’s just a little too big for his face. Church is the first one to pull off his helmet, and the reds follow suit, even you, though you have no idea what’s going on and don’t understand what implication removing your helmet around this guy has. At least this Flowers guy seems to recognize the others, and gushes over the fact that you have all stayed alive and together for so long.

“Oh-and you’ve got a few new additions, too! How delightful!” suddenly, there is the strange feeling of lurking doom as Flowers grabs your hand and shakes it with a friendliness that is so friendly it can’t be real. His handshake is perfect, his smile is still creepy but absolutely perfect, and the long dark hair that is braided and pulled over a shoulder falls off and swings away. The world is in slow motion. You swear the edges of your vision turn pink and gain hearts. Oh god, is this how Donut sees all the time?  
Thankfully, the moment is a dud, and only lasts a second with no romantic intention before you realize this is the part of the conversation where you say your name.

“Simmons. Dick Simmons.” You mumble, and Flowers lights up.

“Always wanted to meet a Dick!” He jokes before leaning in next to you and muttering in your ear. “Or a Dick’s dick, if you catch my drift.” He jabs his elbow in your side and you can’t help but immediately pull your helmet back on to hide your shameful flush at the very implication. You don’t really pay attention for a little while after that, your head is full of question marks and you never knew this guy in the first place, so you don’t exactly have any…catching up to do with him.  
You do catch that this Flowers guy used to be a member of the blue team before he was…reunited with some old lover? And then the two of them left to join another group? You aren’t exactly thinking with your-

“Caboose, he’s not Orlando, he’s Florida!” Tucker suddenly brings together all the missing links in your head and you actually start thinking with your real brain.

“So wait-” you turn to Donut and Church, who are just kind of…existing, at the moment, off to one side. “These two are freelancers?”

“Yeah, Florida and Wyoming. They got separated once, and we ended up taking care of Florida until Wyoming came and found him, and then the two went off to join up with their freelancer pals. It was all very romantic, almost like a scene out of a movie!” Donut sighs wistfully.

“Yeah, because Wyoming thinking we were holding Flowers hostage and beating our asses because Tex was out on patrol is oh so romantic.” Church grumbles.

“Oh hush up!” Donut snaps at him. “I’m talking about the part after that! The dramatic slow run, the happy giggling spin-twirl, the-”

“Be glad you missed it, Simmons. It was the gayest thing ever.”

“It was amazing.” Donut sighs again.

“Right…thanks for clearing that up, I guess…” You say, turning away from the gayest conversation you’ve ever had (and yes, that does include conversations you’ve had with Grif, which are never really that gay because the two of you are NOT a thing you kissed him only three times damn you Donut shut up about it) and back to the whole situation with Florida and Wyoming. Nobody seems to be mad at Flowers, but Wyoming kinda…hangs back. He doesn’t seem to want to be in the crowd or even in the moment. His eyes are trained on the door to the bookstore, as if at any moment a hoard of zombies are going to break in. True, the train station is full of zombies, but it’s not likely you’re in much danger, considering most everyone except Tucker’s son and the one who wants to be Tucker’s son is decked out in full-body armor, and while the two freelancers aren’t they are fucking FREELANCERS, but you appreciate the vigilance.

You don’t know who mentions Wash, Maine, and CT first, but you can tell when it gets mentioned, because the atmosphere in the room changes entirely. Florida stops smiling that creepy smile, and for some reason it’s creepier without than it is with. Wyoming’s eyes get larger, and he does move a little closer to Florida.

“Are they okay?” You would’ve placed bets on Florida saying it, but it’s Wyoming that voices the question. There’s a moment of silence, where everyone waits to see who is going to give them the bad news. It ends up being Caboose.

“Oh, they are fine!”

“Oh what a relief-”

“They are big scary freelancers who can take having their throat explodeded and their arms broken! Grrr, freelancer growling!” Caboose almost laughs as he says it, and you have to watch the horror flash through the eyes of the two other freelancers.

“What?” Florida can barely make the sound, it comes out a flabbergasted squeal.

“Hey, don’t get your panties in a bunch. They’re fine. Just…” Tucker tries to soothe his old acquaintance and said person’s mustached companion.

“CT has a bad ankle, and Maine has two broken arms and a bolt through his throat.” Church blatantly says. Wyoming looks more terrified. Florida lets out a whoosh of breath.

“Oh. You had me worried for a second!” Florida forces a laugh, and when nobody else gets what’s funny, his very fake smile vanishes. “Take us to them. Now.”


	18. the escape

You realize just how amazing the suits are when you have to travel with people not wearing them.

You shouldn’t say that. Wyoming and Florida were very good at protecting Junior, using a few freelancer tricks such as “shoot every single zombie in your path” and “run really fast”. However, the big problem with the train station is that it’s just…a pain, really. Sure, it has some really good supplies that haven’t been taken yet, but there’s a very specific reason why that is.

There’s a fuckton of zombies in the train station. Seriously, in the time you were in the bookstore, about twenty zombies passed by. Wyoming and Florida are just good at masking themselves the same way everyone else does-get really gross and dirty. You don’t have to walk slow, you don’t have to soak yourself in guts, just stay as gross and unclean as you possibly can. At the base, everyone but Grif practices the opposite of that, because you don’t have to smell bad. You don’t smell in the armor. Zombies don’t care about people in armor, you’ve said that before and you’ll say it again.

Especially now.

You guys are so used to blending in and walking through zombie crowds that you don’t realize the problem until you’re already halfway through an alternate route that Wyoming recommended, saying something in British about how it was faster and cleared up. Tucker won’t let go of Junior for anything, even if his son has literal mud smudged over his face. Junior is pretty safe, especially with everyone circling around him for protecting.

Palomo, however, is not as dirty. Actually, no. He is dirty as fuck. He smells as bad as Grif on a hot day, as he should. It’s good to smell bad in scenarios like this.  
Problem is, he doesn’t smell like the dead. He smells like teenager.  
He smells like meat.

You’re not sure how he was surviving on his own up above, but you have only know the guy for a few hours and you’ll cut this kid a little slack. However, all slack is immediately uncut when your group gets ever so closer to the exit. Turns out, you walk through a very crowded area to get to this easy path.

Of fucking course you do.

Which leads you to now. You are unloading rounds into every zombie you can, the rest of the crew doing the same. Palomo and Junior are in the middle, guarded by Florida and Wyoming, because when a hoard attacks no amount of smell aversion is going to keep them from at least trying to nibble you.

You can’t hear very well over the gunfire, but you’re pretty sure Junior is screaming. You turn just in time to watch Tucker curb-stomp a zombie crawling along the floor, splattering the brains all over the floor. He kicks the head as far away as he can, and it leaves a dark stain of blood in its wake.

One more thing about zombies. They will eat each other.

Yes, that’s right. Zombies do not just eat living humans. Zombies will eat other zombies if they smell like flesh or blood and not just constant death. Killing a zombie actually brings more zombies to the area unless you do it right, because zombies just want to eat flesh. If zombies get too hungry, even, they’ll just eat another zombie. You’ve watched one eat its own arm before, actually. You’re going to not recall that memory.  
The point is, there are enough dead bodies to keep this hoard occupied for a little while. That’s another advantage to wearing the armor-you get to pull off this kind of shit without batting an eyelash. You get to shoot a few zombies to let your silly non-armored companions slip out and toward the exit.

“Let’s g-t-f-o.” Tucker snaps very quietly. Junior is already running to the door, Palomo right on his heel. One downside of the armor-it’s really heavy and thus, horrible to run in.  
What choice do you honestly have, though? It’s either run like mad or watch people get eaten again. You never want to watch someone get eaten again. That was horrifying. Fuck, you’re going to have those nightmares tonight.  
You’re unsure how close you are when the hoard stops caring about the bodies. It’s not like you’re the front of the line, and besides, zombies never care about eating corpses for long. Damned creatures are always hungry. Thankfully, you’re apparently very close when Florida actually slows down.

“Did we take a wrong turn?” Caboose asks. For once, his question is valid. The space in front of you doesn’t look anything like a way out. It looks like a pile of stuff, all rocksliding down and blocking off any possible exit. The freelancers start reaching into the pile of shit, pulling out various objects-pieces of pipe, broken wood planks, bricks, rocks, a piece of a car door. The group joins them, frantically digging through the rubbish to try to find a way through.

The call of “I think I see light!” and “Guys, they found us” happens simultaneously.

Florida wastes no time forcing himself into the makeshift hole and squirming around until he lets out a victory yell and a hand pops back down through the hole to yank someone else up.

“Are there zombies up there?” Tucker asks.

“The usual loner, about four blocks down. Nothing to be worried about!”

“Can we hurry this up, guys? Fuck, they’re getting closer!” Grif calls from where he stands in the rear of the group. His voice is faster and his gun is raised, almost as if someone mentioned bats. His panic isn’t unwarranted, though, as the groans and moans of the undead do wander closer-and when they round the corner, it turns into a mad rush to get everyone up the hole as quick as possible. The blues go first, all apart from the stocky Caboose, and then Sarge practically pushes Donut up all by himself. Sarge grabs you next, yanking you by the arm and pushing you towards the hole, and when you don’t scurry fast enough he shoves you up and crawls out himself. Grif has started firing a few shots when Sarge grabs hold of Caboose’s hand and yanks him out of the hole-barely. The group stands above the ground, catching their breath and letting the panic die down.

“Hey! How the fuck am I supposed to do this?” It’s Grif.

Oh no.

Grif.

“You have to at least try!” you yell down, and you slide back over to the hole and reach an arm down. Grif grabs your arm with desperation, desperate to find some purchase on the junk pile and get himself up and through.  
The hole is too small. Fuck, Caboose could barely get through, there’s no way Grif is squeezing his fat ass through this tiny hole.

“Simmons! Don’t let go! I can’t die! I’m too good-looking to die!”

“Shut up, we’ll get you out, okay? Calm the fuck-” you start saying in the least panicky voice you can muster, but suddenly the pull on your arms gets stronger. You sink into the hole all the way down to your shoulder, and you have to cling to the rubbish around you just so Grif doesn’t yank you back in.

“Get off me! Get off me you stupid fucking zombie! Simmons, help!” Grif is screaming. You’re desperately trying to tug back at whatever must be pulling on Grif, because the strain on your arm is much stronger than it was a few seconds ago.  
You feel like you did when Grif fell off the wall. Your nerves and muscles are screaming at you to let go, to let him go. His hands are only clutched in your fingertips, it’s so hard to hold on.

It’s so hard to hold on.

You can’t.

It’s too hard to hold on. Your body forces your fingers to slip against your will.

“Simmons!” You hear Grif scream, followed by a clunking sound and undead groans.

“Grif!” You scream, pushing yourself as far into the hole as you can, reaching around for any sign of him. You’re about to push your upper half through again when Sarge stops you with a hand on your other arm, tugging you up and to your feet as you reach helplessly to the hole.

“He’s…” you start, but there’s nothing else to say. He’s gone.

“Well. Grif is dead. Never thought there would be a time when Grif’s death didn’t make me happy, but…here it is. Alright men, bow your heads, moment of silence.” And with that, Sarge does bow his head politely at the hole. You want to scream about how you should be going back down there and saving Grif, it’s not like he’s already dead, he’s just under a zombie pile, but your throat is stuck fast and you can’t find the words.

“You know, sometimes, in zombie films, a guy who you think is dead turns out to be alive later! So he’s probably fine!” Donut tries desperately to keep the group in good spirits.

“Damnit Donut, this was a moment of silence! Oh well, it was probably long enough for him anyway. Rest in peace…dirtbag.” Sarge says, and he straightens up and starts walking away. The others begin to follow, and your throat does find some words.

“Shouldn’t we…go get him? It’s not like he’s actually dead, guys, cmon.”

“Simmons, he’s trapped underground with a hoard of zombies! That’s pretty dead, son.”

“No, he’s stuck underground in a hoard of zombies in full body armor. He should be just fine!”

“No, there’s no possible way he isn’t dead!”

“I could just take a peak down there-”

“No.”

“It would take like three seconds-”

“Simmons.” Florida throws in, keeping you and Sarge from continuing the endless back and forth. “Think about it. If he were still alive, we would be hearing screaming.”

“But-”

“Best not to think on it any longer, son. Cmon. Let’s get back home.” Sarge replies in a voice that definitely doesn’t suit him. He seems almost fatherly to you, and when you don’t walk on your own, he wraps an arm around your shoulder and guides you on.

You look back once.


	19. York

You blink once, and the journey back to the base is over. You remember none of it. You’re pretty sure you spent the whole thing in a haze. You remember saying one “yeah” to Donut, but you don’t remember what he asked you. The rest of the team is…  
You’re unsure how they are so calm about this. How they were just okay with walking away and not doing anything. Didn’t they care about Grif?  
Fuck, thinking about even just his name is painful right now.

Wash is back from his quest before you, unsurprisingly. He and his freelancer buddies are sitting around and chatting. You’re not sure who’s who. You don’t honestly care.

“You’re back!” Wash gleefully cries, rushing up to the entrance when Grif’s sister (oh fuck, who’s going to tell her) opens the door for you all. Junior doesn’t get down from his dad’s arms, he just makes Tucker and Wash walk closer until he can give Wash a hug. Wash darkens in his cheeks, and he and Tucker exchange a look that you know all too well. Fuck, you owe Grif even more money now.

Oh. Wait. That’s right. You don’t owe him anything anymore.

“Wait a-Wash?? You’re here too??” Florida gawks, overdramatic and gasping. Wash’s expression does a few backflips before he connects the dots that you brought back more freelancers. He doesn’t get to make this realization before Florida has him wrapped in a bone crushing hug. For such a small guy, he can really lift.

“Wait-Florida’s here? Oh man, please tell me that pompous assfuck Wyoming didn’t-” comes the call of a stranger, who strolls up to the new part with the two others in tow. This guy is half-blind and all smiles, other eye closed and he struts up. When he opens his eye, his expression does a 180 and plummets into a look of seething rage. Wyoming smiles, eyes narrowed in a challenge, and gives him a little wave.

“Hello.” Wyoming sings, greeting who you assume to be York with the most sinister sing-song hello you’ve ever heard. “How’s the eye, old chum?”

“Still as blind as when you, you know, SHOT ME IN THE FUCKING FACE, Wyoming.” York says.

“Well, if you’re going to be so angry about it, I could always give you a matching set!”

“Oh right, right. Hey Wyoming, knock knock.” York grins, hands slipping behind his back. Florida and Wash suddenly look scared. On the other hand, Wyoming looks excited.

“Who’s there?”

“It’s York.” Florida starts shifting closer to Wyoming. Wash’s eyes flutter between the two freelancers.

“It’s York…who?”

“It’s your catch, asshole.” York says very calmly, as if he doesn’t pull a knife out and throw it at the British man who apparently caused his blind eye. Florida grabs onto him and moves him out of the way, but it isn’t needed, because Wyoming seemed to be expecting it, and steps aside anyway. York starts running at him, and when Wyoming notices him, he simply pulls out the sniper rifle that hangs out on his back and starts to aim it.

“An eye for an eye, motherfucker!” York yells as he gets close enough to begin combat, and just when he’s close enough-

“Enough!” it’s Florida that steps in, one hand pushing away the sniper rifle as it goes off and the other catching York’s chest with a flat palm. The gunshot echoes throughout the base for a solid moment, and the silence afterward is only for Florida to say things in. “Both of you, knock it off! You are guests here, not enemies, okay?” He looks between them, and they are still glaring at each other. “Boys, do I make myself clear?”

“Absolutely.” Snarls Wyoming.

“Crystal.” Snarls York.

“Good. There’s been too much death today, I will not tolerate any needless bloodshed.”

“Wait-death?” Wash asks, eyes wide. The group tries not to, you know they don’t mean to, but they look at you. As if you’re the one who’ll dramatically start sobbing about how Grif is dead any second now.

Jokes on them. You’re doing just…fine.

Okay, so you aren’t. You feel so alone, now more than you did before you met this group. Grif’s death just…doesn’t feel real to you. Like he isn’t dead, he just…isn’t here right now.  
Wash notices the lack of orange among the group. You can tell, because suddenly he gets much quieter, and his mouth forms an O. Kaikaina, however, can’t make the connection. Figures it has to be explained to her.

“What happened?” she squeaks. “Where’s Dex?” She looks at each of you in turn, and oddly enough, it’s Sarge that steps forward to take her aside and tell her what happened. Inside the quiet of your helmet, you sniffle.

“Well, this seems as good a time as any to switch topics to things that are not Grif’s death!” Donut starts once Sarge has Kai far away from the groups, spinning his hands around themselves before he gestures to Palomo. “Guys, new hot guys I don’t yet know, meet Palomo!”

“Palomo? Charles, what are you doing out here?”

“Mr. Doyle?” Palomo perks up, but also looks even more confused than most of you feel right now. One of the strangers steps out, and Jesus Christ is today English stereotypes day? Because once again, you’ve found an Englishman with a curved mustache and a face too clean to be in the zombie apocalypse.

“Palomo, did something happen? Where are the others? Where’s Ms. Kimball??” Mr. Doyle says, increasing in the amount of panic behind each word. He latches onto the boy, shaking the kid as he freaks the fuck out.

“They’re fine, please stop shaking me!” Palomo’s voice wiggles as he tries to calm Doyle down.

“Where are they? Why are you on your own?” Doyle asks even more questions, hands still clutching the boy’s shoulders, but the shaking has stopped.

“As far as I know, they’re still over in Armonia!”

“Why are you out here on your own??” Doyle asks, and Palomo sinks in posture and quietly says something you’re pretty sure not even Doyle can hear. Doyle lets go of him with a sigh, says something else you don’t catch, and at this point you’re much more interested in the flash of yellow that runs from one side of the blue base to the other. Kai must not be taking this very well.  
Well, not everyone can be so nonchalant about Grif’s death as Sarge is right now. He soldiers right on, marches back over to the group and takes his spot like he wasn’t even missing.

“Oh, dear me, I forgot to even introduce myself.” The second Englishman says once he’s noticed Sarge coming back, pushing Palomo out of the way to step forward. “Donald Doyle, at your service.”

“Are you the surgeon guy?” Church asks.

“Beg your pardon?”

“Wash was going after a surgeon guy.”

“Oh, you won’t find her out here.” York answers, stepping up next to Doyle. “Emily and that Doc guy are already patching Maine up.”

“How is Maine, anyway?” Wyoming quips. York swallows down the look of annoyance and answers with a “He’s doing okay, so far. Not dead yet.”  
And that answer is the last thing you care about before you just sorta…tune out. You know you shouldn’t, you should be learning what you can about these new people, but fuck, it’s hard to focus when you keep half-expecting to hear sarcasm coming from the short orange blob that stands next to you. You listen as well as you can for any crucial information, but there’s not much else that’s new before Sarge decides enough is enough, and the standing around doing nothing is accomplishing just that-nothing. The teams separate, the freelancers move off to wait around outside the medical area, and Doyle and Palomo walk off with the blues-mainly because Palomo is following Tucker, whom you can tell just wants to get away and be with his son for a while. Junior has latched himself onto his father, and won’t let go even if his life depended on it.

The red half of the base is quiet. The four of you that are left have nothing more to really say. At least, you don’t. You’re going to spend the next few hours wallowing, and maybe the next few after that.  
You don’t cry. You’re a bit surprised by the fact that you don’t, considering how much it feels like you want to and should be. You instead just sort of lay down and stare at a wall for a long period of time. Maybe you fall asleep. Maybe you don’t. Like the first night you stayed here, you don’t remember doing anything of the sort.

You remember waking up in the wrong room, though. You’re in Grif’s room when you wake up, and you don’t remember walking in here, but at the same time, you don’t care. You only wake up because you hear a knock at the door and Donut asking if you’re in there. You don’t reply. He opens the door anyway, walks in without invitation, and doesn’t say a word to you.

You sit up and pat the spot next to you. He sits down. You don’t say anything as he wraps himself around you, burying his face in your shoulder. He does cry. He cries enough where you’re going to have to wash this shirt again later. You had to the first time because Grif decided to use you as a napkin.

You swear, you don’t cry.


	20. Cryptic Freelancer bullshit

The regular routine is so hard to sink into with Grif gone.

Like, jesus, you never thought it would be so hard to do the things you normally do without him just constantly nearby. Fuck, you remember there were days you wanted him gone so you could actually fix things around here, not spend most of your time arguing.

Case in point, the base AI system. How much effort had you sunk into getting this thing up and rolling? How much of your energy was wasted by Grif’s constant sarcastic commentary?  
Oh yeah. You probably should mention that you finally fixed it. You were making this thing out to be a lot harder than it was, surprisingly. Maybe you wanted the challenge. Maybe you just weren’t paying enough attention with Grif around. Either way, it’s finally working, and you don’t really care.

Mainly because the AI sounds exactly like the tank does. Sister AIs, evidently. This one calls herself Filss. It’s pronounced Fillis, but spelled Filss, so no matter what Caboose is confused by it. What you’re confused by, however, is something else entirely.

Tex spends most of her time not around. She’s apparently instructed the blues to not speak about her, and she has yet to make her presence known to the other freelancers. However, when you told her you got the system up and running, she demanded five minutes to talk to it alone. Fuck if you really care, Tex is frightening to be around, and you have a bad feeling she’s trying to instill fear into the new AI system. But Filss is completely cheerful when you talk to her next, and merely says “Texas wanted to speak about something personal, I hope you won’t mind my discretion about it.”  
But the AI is a different story. She’s less important news, compared to what the big news around here is.

Maine’s back up on his feet. The surgeon that Wash went after, Dr. Emily Grey, is completely nuts but good at her job. Maine, however, can’t exactly…talk anymore. The noise that comes out of his mouth sounds like horrible animalistic growling, not actual words. Most of the freelancers can’t understand him.  
You say most, because for some reason, Wash can. Right from the first attempt at speaking, Wash knew instantly what the guy was saying. He now pretty much goes where Maine goes, acting as translator for the big guy. Not that he really needs it, considering he barely says anything anyway.

The freelancers are certainly a different bunch. For starters, Wyoming and York can’t get along in the slightest. Every time they are in a room together, they start bickering. However, they have learned to bicker quietly. If Florida hears them fight, he does not hesitate to threaten…something. You haven’t seen him actually do whatever he threatens to do, because apparently him threatening it is powerful enough to shut Wyoming and York up. Florida…continues to creep you out, in a weird way. He’s sweet and kind, but there’s just something about the way he smiles that keeps you from ever truly relaxing around him. Plus, he’s a bit hypersexual. You thought Donut was bad, and then this guy showed up and you would graciously take a Donut double entendre over a Florida sexual fact. Donut, however, adores Florida, so you basically avoid them both for the sake of mental health.

There isn’t much else to say about them, though. CT is secretive, and apparently that’s always been the case because the other freelancers don’t react to her mysterious ways. York is the biggest frat boy you’ve ever met, but he’s at least nice, even if he doesn’t talk to you much. Really, none of the new people talk to you much. Mainly because they like to keep to their own, and with Wash over with the blues so much, they also gravitate toward the blues. Sarge hates that fact, says it outright to you one morning that he can’t stand that red team is down a man and the blue team is up four.

This is not to say, however, that the blue team is the only one the new people gravitate towards. Surprisingly, Dr. Grey and Mr. Doyle prefer to be around your side of the base. Maybe it’s because it’s quieter, maybe it has something to do with Sarge showing genuine affection toward the surgeon lady (you swear, you never saw that coming), but either way, they are over here often. Not always, but often.

With so many new people around, you’ve finally cracked open the main barracks, just so they have a place to sleep. Apparently, Wash has forfeited his quarters to Palomo, and he sleeps with the other freelancers in the barracks. (Sleeps. SLEEPS. Goddamn it Donut, not everything is about sex!)  
Oh yeah, you feel like you should mention, Tucker is jealous. Grif isn’t here to point it out anymore, and since Tucker won’t admit it on his own, it’s up to you to take note of all the interactions between Tucker and Wash. You wish Grif were here, because you know he’d get a kick out of how awkward things have become between them. York keeps make jokes about how Tucker is “Wash’s new boyfriend”, which implies that he had an old one. You suspect it might have been Maine, but there’s no way in fuck you’re ever going to ask about that and there’s no way in fuck you care enough to really know what’s going on.

That was always Grif’s job, after all.

You suppose you should talk a little about the days after Grif’s…departure. It’s been two weeks now, after all, and the season is fast approaching winter. The days are getting cold.  
You realized very quickly that Sarge was never going to say how much he missed Grif. He was always going to pretend it was a burden lifted, that Grif was nothing but annoying to him. Donut was the opposite, he voiced how much he missed Grif until he eventually found a way to move on.

Surprisingly, Doc was the one who had the most emotional reaction. He immediately excused himself from the room with tears brimming in his eyes, and locked himself away until he could go back to being cheerful, pleasant Doc. Of course, his reaction had nothing on Kaikaina’s, which was days of drinking herself to sleep and occasionally waddling over to the red base to tell you something about her brother she just remembered. You have literally no idea why she told you any of the stories she did. You did learn that their mother apparently abandoned them to go join the circus, and that they had no idea who their father even was. You actually learned a lot of things about Grif that he never told you.  
And, according to her, he liked you. Actually liked you. Funny how you found out he actually was okay with you as a person after he was already gone.

You’ll be brutally honest, it doesn’t feel real. You spent the first week constantly cracking a joke to thin air, only to realize once again that Grif isn’t there and turn back to your work. Actually, the urge to crack jokes to the hints of orange you somehow catch on the corners of your eyes hasn’t stopped, you’ve just stopped saying them. You don’t want to set any bad impressions on the new people, after all.  
Not that the new people care. Everyone’s too busy planning a trip to Armonia to check up on some Kimball lady and a bunch of Palomo’s friends. Oh yeah, you probably should have said that first. You’re all planning a trip to Armonia to check on some Kimball lady and a bunch of Palomo’s friends.

The idea came up a few days ago, when some other freelancer called York to ask him if he was still with that Doyle guy. Apparently another freelancer (freelancers? Fuck you don’t know) found this Kimball chick, and Kimball mentioned something about Doyle, and yadda-yadda nobody ever fucking tells you anything about what’s going on. What you do know, however, is that you are being included in the away team. Maybe. Nobody has made definitive plans as of yet, and you figure there won’t be any actual planning until Tex makes herself known to the other freelancers.

You figure you should find it weird that she’s up here with you, then. She hasn’t made her presence known to the other freelancers, but yet for some reason…she’s sitting here, next to you, silently watching the sunset.

“Tex?” You begin to ask, after about ten minutes of awkward silence.

“Simmons, you ditched your last group, right?”

“I…yes. I did. Why do you-”

“Do you think you would leave this one?” What? Why is Tex asking you this?

“What…do you mean, exactly?”

“What’s keeping you here, Simmons? As far as I can tell, you’ve been struggling ever since you left Grif behind. Why didn’t you go back for him?” She looks at you. Well, sort of. She’s still in armor, so all you see is your face reflected on her visor. Your terrified face echoes uncertainty back at you.

“I-I-” you start, but you don’t get to finish. Your throat is stuck. She looks back to the horizon.

“I’m leaving. The freelancers can’t know I’m alive.”

“Why?” What the fuck is she talking about?

“Carolina.” Why is every word she’s saying only making this entire conversation more confusing?

“The leader of the freelancers?” more importantly, why are you acting like you understand it?

“Simmons, do me a favor. Don’t tell anyone. When they ask, just say I didn’t tell you.” Tex says, standing up. “Seriously, why are you still here?”

“Tex, what the fuck, you aren’t making any-Tex!” She’s gone. Your head is spinning from trying to process what you just heard. Why is Tex leaving? Why is Tex telling you she’s leaving?  
Why the fuck did she just spit out a bunch of philosophical bullshit and then disappear??

You hear the opening and shutting of the main gate. It does nothing to help you understand what the fuck she was just talking about, but you think at least one thing is clear.  
Tex, after all, would be the only one strong enough to leave you all behind.  
Okay, cut it out with the cryptic bullshit, Simmons. You got enough of that from her, no need to add to it. Tomorrow, you’re going to get some answers. Maybe. That just sounded like a cryptic enough clincher of a thought to end your dusk reflections, to be honest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy fuck, this one might have been the hardest to write. I'm sorry if this one seems a bit whack pace-wise, I'm trying to set up a lot of shit for the next chapters and had to get this chunk in first.


	21. Armonia

Armonia. In its golden age, Armonia was THE city. It had everything, it seemed. You remember spending hours upon hours poring over books just to get a chance to go to Armonia for university. You had big plans back then, you were going to work your scrawny ass off and make a name for yourself. It’s been so long now, but you still remember the rejection letter. At the time, you thought your life was over.

How fitting that it actually was, in a way. No, the apocalypse didn’t happen right after that. That was several years and several rejections later, not all rejections from school. How stubborn you were, wasting so much time trying to get into Armonia. You were young, you were smart. You could’ve been so much more, Simmons.  
But Armonia is a shell now. It’s an empty, lifeless area. All the energy and life and excitement the city once bore is long since gone. The intimidating shadow it casts is an empty threat.

Speaking of empty threats, you should probably mention that Church has it out for you. Since you were the last person she talked to, he somehow thinks you know where Tex went. You repeat over and over to the stubborn brick wall that you have no idea what the fuck she was talking about, but Church ended the conversation with a promise to send a sniper round through your gut if he finds out you’re holding out on him. He’d miss anyway, so you aren’t really scared.

This is the first time the entire group has been out of the base with no one left to guard it. It’s not that the base isn’t secure-with Filss there, there’s no way a break-in is going to happen-it’s more that Sarge and Church both insisted on their team being the one to go to Armonia, and to settle things down Florida proposed you all just go. Sheila and Filss will watch over the base, things will be fine for the trip. The problem wasn’t security, but transportation. You still had Felix’s car, fixed up to run like the jeep did-solar power. Felix will probably kill you once he sees what you had to do to the engine to get it working with solar-in fact, Lopez spent the entire time he was fixing it up sobbing in Spanish. Lopez, of course, found and revived the jeep a long while back. You remember the afternoon he spent cursing at you while you hid in a closet, locked in for a few hours so that fiery Latin temper would calm down. It didn’t, the moment you came out of the closet (Jesus, Donut, not like that) Lopez tried to beat you to death with a wrench. Sarge tried to charge the blues two dollars each to watch. None of them had any money, though, so he settled for two strawberry Yoohoos and a Kit-Kat.  
So in total, that’s nine seats. Seven, actually, because by default Palomo and Doyle have to go. Seven seats to fit seventeen people (eighteen, actually, because Maine is so large-seriously, he’s eight fucking feet tall, this guy is enormous). Naturally, you need more vehicles.

However, you find something way better. A bus.

Yeah, this thing isn’t in the best of shape. A few windows are shot out, one tire is missing (not just flat or rimmed out, actually missing) and there was a bit of a moral squabble for a while because you found a bunch of dead children on board. They weren’t zombies, just bodies. Bullet holes through a few of them. You didn’t have time to bury them all, so in the end, you stacked the bodies in a ditch and burned them. Nobody said anything for a long while after that. Sarge made you and Donut scrub the fuck out of the inside, just so it would smell less like death. There’s always going to be a permanent dark spot where the bodies were, though-a solid black dot on the floor, a stain not even Donut could clean out. Lopez fixed the engine, the blues…well, for lack of a better word, “fixed” the missing windows with some boards and an automatic drill, and the freelancers went on a hunt to find a tire that could replace the missing one. You got to watch Maine pick up a car. It was terrifying.

A few hours and minor electrocutions later, the bus was working. Sort of. It wasn’t moving yet, because solar engines need lots of time to power up. Also, you weren’t moving either, because Lopez totally zapped you on purpose with an electric wire and your prosthetic was fried. He had to fix it, though, which he did while also grumbling and occasionally rubbing his grease-covered hands on what was left of your real leg. He did this for no reason other than to drive you crazy, because Lopez can really hold a grudge if he wants to.

Point is, you now have a bus. A bus, however, that won’t be moving until at least tomorrow if you’re lucky. Also, none of you know how to drive a bus. Grif would, he could drive pretty much anything.  
Kaikaina, however, ends up being the one who somehow has the experience necessary to drive a fucking bus. She starts telling the story of how she learned, but Wash makes her stop telling it when she starts saying how she repaid the bus guy. Newsflash, it was with sex.

The freelancers pointed out that wasn’t really a point in going all the way to the base (or in leaving the bus unprotected) so you spent the night with a campfire next to the bus. It’s been a long time since anyone held a bonfire, even at the base, so it’s pretty fun. You learn a bit more about how the freelancers operate, at least-they are all extremely chill. In fact, they are so relaxed around each other that York literally flirts with Wash right in front of the entire group and none of the freelancers seem bothered by it. Wash actually flirts right back, as if that’s just the natural response to it. Tucker’s grip on a marshmallow stick he’s holding for Junior gets tighter. He burns the marshmallows, but Junior doesn’t mind too much.

Because the group is so large, there’s more people than shifts for watch, so you get lucky and get to sleep the entire night. However, you don’t sleep at all. The night is cold, even with armor on. You wake up with phantom pains running through the leg you don’t have any more. You wake up because the boarded windows cast a dim light, and you feel like you’re still in that tool shed. You wake up because you hear a noise that sounds like a zombie. You wake up because someone puts more wood in the fire or because the watch shift changes. You wake up a lot, Simmons, because you just can’t sleep. Sleeping in the bus reminds you too much of the time you spent on your own, despite the people around you.

You sleep on the trip, instead. Nobody really cares, you find a spot in the back and curl into the bus seat, in a position that’s just a wee bit awkward but there isn’t any better way. Occasionally, the bus will be too loud with people talking; or, at some points, singing-turns out the freelancers really love singing along to music on their trips, and occasionally there will be a song enough people know so that the entire bus is belting out the lyrics. You join in once, but you’re so quiet with it that only Doc, who is in the back end of the bus with you, really notices. At one point, you remember Doc moving over to you and the two of you having a conversation. It was about how things were going. It was really about Grif. Turns out Doc and Grif are-were-really good friends. Sort of. They were relaxed around each other, but neither of them really went out of their way to make sure the other was okay or anything. Doc admitted that Grif got him to smoke once. You had no idea Grif used to smoke. Doc said it was because Grif had to quit, for the fact that he would eventually have no more. “It’s always been odd to me,” he said, “because you don’t think that people would loot cigarettes, but like Church’s coffee, cigarettes are hard to find.” You doubt it, because of how many cigarettes there have to be still, but you’re glad Doc convinced him to stop. Doc ended up falling asleep on your shoulder. You did a quick check to make sure nobody was looking before you passed out too. You woke up to the sound of Donut’s mockery giggle at the two of you, and you pushed Doc back over to the other side of the bus and flipped Donut off before trying to nap again.

You’re not exactly sure why actually getting to Armonia makes you think back on your life. Maybe it was riding in a school bus. Maybe it’s just something about Armonia itself. Either way, you’re sorry this place was ever ruined by the apocalypse.  
The bus is still a good mile out from the city when CT hops to her feet and tells Kaikaina to stop the bus immediately. She does, a little too fast, and the crew you have amassed in this bus all get thrown forward.

“What? What is it? Is it cops?” Kaikaina yells back.

“We’re about to be bottlenecked.”

“That better mean something other than what I think it means, because I could go for a few bottle necks right now.”

“I-what? No, nevermind, it’s an old freelancer trick, as soon as we crossed past that car-” CT points to something you can’t see, because you’re in the back of the bus still. “-it gets triggered, moving it to cut us off from behind, and just around that bend is a blockade, so we wouldn’t be able to get out without getting caught.”

“So one of your buddies set a trap for us? Great, what a welcome party.” Church says sarcastically, and Wash shoves him as he gets up and walks to the front of the bus. He and CT open the door and walk out. Long silence follows them. Long, empty silence. Caboose asks what’s going on four times. There are a few gunshots, but when Maine rushes outside, they stop. Longer, heavier silence.

CT returns to the bus with three loud bangs on the door and a call of “Hey, guys, come out here!” You all go, of course, because you all have a knack for being curious.

“Reds, Blues, meet the Dakota twins!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaa, another shortie! Sorry this one is so short, it's because the next one has to be long-it's got the twins in it, after all, plus a few other surprises!  
> Thank you all for enjoying this ride so far, I really appreciate all the nice comments and attention this work has been getting-and I promise, more to come, and soon! I won't keep you waiting this time, I promise. Until then, thank you!


	22. The Dakotas

“Well, okay, let me rephrase that. Meet ONE of the Dakota twins!” CT corrects herself as you all wander out, gesturing to a woman who immediately throws an arm over CT’s shoulders and pecks her on the cheek. She’s taller than CT, which doesn’t mean much, but she’s also muscular as hell-and despite it being the zombie apocalypse, she has perfect eyeliner, accentuated by the bags under her eyes and hair right out of a scene phase-bleach blonde with the tips highlighted, sticking out just from beyond her face as if she had gone two angles with a straightening iron. Where the fuck did she get purple hair dye in the apocalypse? “South, these are the reds and blues; reds, blues, this is South Dakota. North’s on his way over from whatever place he was holed up in.”

“Ah, sniper habits.” Florida mutters with an air of fondness. Wyoming just frowns more. CT takes the time to say your names, but you know there’s no way this South chick is going to remember any of them. Except for Donut, because you see her smile at that one. You’re a bit scared by that.

“So, guys, why the fuck are you here?”

“South, can you not-” Wash starts, gesturing to Junior, who sits on his dad’s shoulders.

“What, what’s wrong with me cursing around the little vagina spawn? Hey kid, you wanna learn a new motherfucking word?” South asks Junior, who nods quietly. South is about to open her mouth again when CT cocks her with a hip.

“Hey, the kid can handle ass loads of zombies but can’t hear the word fuck? What kinda bullshit is that?” She crosses her arms, but doesn’t say anything more. Junior deflates a little, going back to leaning heavily on Tucker’s armored head.

“Jesus Christ South, hasn’t even been five minutes and you’re already trying to start trouble.” York tries to sound mad, but he’s also chuckling, and he isn’t the best actor.

Of course, nobody needs acting when South’s reaction to York moving out of the crowd is to immediately point a gun at him.

“South! What are you-” CT asks.

“Get. The fuck. Out of here.” South practically growls at York, who doesn’t even blink twice.

“Yeah, missed you too.”

“I mean it. Go walk your pretty boy ass off a goddamn bridge.”

“Aw, you think I’m pretty?” York coons. Wash laughs a little, but shuts up with South’s glare.

“Look, I don’t know how much these new friends of yours might know, but I know you, and if you think I’m letting you within ten fucking feet of my brother ever again, I will personally create a world government just to get a legal restraining order.”

“South, put the fucking gun down.” A new voice enters the fray. South’s eyes stop squint-glaring as heavily, but she doesn’t put the gun down. A very tall, very muscular, and very much not like South at all guy comes strutting on over, not bothering to give the group a look over before he stops in front of his sister and says something you don’t catch. She curses twice-no, three times-and puts the gun down, still sneering at York from over her brother’s massive shoulders.

“Sorry about her, she’s always been quick to start fights-good for zombies, not so good for normal people.” North’s smile is almost as big as his nose-which is big.

“I’m standing right here, you bitch.” South monotones very loudly from right behind him.

“So, who’s all-oh.” North suddenly notices the person South was having a problem with-mostly because he’s standing on his own, since nobody else wanted a take a bullet for…reasons you don’t know. There’s no way of saying what happens next other than to say that North literally fucking blushes with his entire face and starts to rub the back of his neck, trying to act all nonchalant. “Hey, York. Haven’t seen you in a while.”

“Hey, in my defense, you’re stationed on the bad side of Armonia.” York jokes, and Palomo almost opens his mouth to say something but doesn’t. North also opens his mouth to say something but doesn’t, instead he gets kicked in the ass by his twin, who uses the opportunity to step between them.

“For fucks sake, this is exactly what happened last time. Either you two stop being gay for five fucking minutes, or I’m going to beat the shit out of both of you.” She cuts off, immediately turning to the main group. “Wash, where are we headed?”

“Toward the old high school. Looking for a schoolteacher and a bunch of teenagers.”

“What, you mean Kimball?”

“Wait, how did you-”

“You won’t find her at the high school. She’s got control of the fucking east city mall.”

“That certainly sounds like Vanessa.” Doyle mutters to himself.

“She’s got things closed down so tight not even we could get in. Bitch knows her shit.”

“Well, Ms. Kimball is good at her job.” Palomo says, shrugging. “Don’t worry though, I can get us in.”

“Well, what are we waiting for then?” North asks. “Seriously, you don’t want to be out here when it gets late. We’ve got a place nearby, if you’d like to rest up a little.”

“Yeah, because resting is so what you have in mind.” Wash jokes, and North actually does laugh for a moment before he suddenly looks like he remembered something random.

“Shit, Wash, that reminds me-saved a little something for ya.” North waves with his hand, and Wash walks the slight distance for North to whisper something in his ear.

Whatever he tells him, it’s exciting, because Wash immediately drops his gun and hugs North around the middle. You have no idea what is happening anymore, because Wash is now sobbing tears of joy and North is just gently patting him on the back.

“What the fuck did you say to him?” Tucker asks, and Junior smacks the top of his helmet as if to tell his own father to watch his mouth.

“My babies are okay!” Washington wails.

“You have kids??” Donut asks in horror, a high pitched wail of shock.

“No, no, not…not human babies. He means his cats.” North answers.

“Hey, it was my idea to even keep them around.” South grumbles.

“Wash…owns cats.” Sarge says, trying to process the information.

“Yeah.” Wash says, regaining his composure and picking his gun back up. “Seven of them.”

“Actually, it’s nine.” North adds on.

“What?” Wash whirls, counting out on his fingers. “No, I only had Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Theta, Delta, Sigma and Omega. That’s seven.”

“Congratu-fucking-lations, Wash. Beta had kittens.” South answers, and Wash gasps like he just won the lottery. Maine grumbles something that nobody else can understand and covers his face with his massive palm. Jesus Christ, that guy has some big fucking hands.

“Even stuck with the weird Greek alphabet thing you had going on, named ‘em Eta and Iota.”

“Oh my god. Where are they? Can we go see them? Please?”

“Later, Wash. First thing first, we need back on the road. Be a dear and move the blockade, won’t you?” Florida asks the Dakotas, who both nod. The rest of you are shepherded back to the bus by Florida without the chance to say anything more, except for York, because when you look back he and North seem to be…in quite a lovely conversation. With their mouths. Totally not just tongue-fucking each other when nobody else seems to be looking except you. And Donut. Donut looks back as if his gaydar has been activated and lets out a little “aw yis” before climbing on the bus.

 

You never thought you were going to witness something like this, but here it is. Wash literally crying into an armful of cats. One of them is trying to gnaw his nose off, and Wash just says “hate you too, Epsilon” and continues to not do anything about the one trying to eat him alive.

“Hang on a second, where did-South where’s your dog?” North yells to his sister as you walk in the tiny place. It’s a modified hotel floor, one room solely devoted to Wash’s cats, who climb all over him while meowing loudly. One of them starts purring at Maine’s legs, trying to lay down on the giant’s giant feet. The rest of you are standing in the hallway, completely shocked at the scene of Wash crying into cats. Caboose picks up a cat that walks to the doorway and shows it to Church, claiming it looks like him. It does have a little cat frown, so you can see the resemblance.

“He wanders as he pleases, how the fuck am I supposed to know?” South answers her brother. Junior pats the side of Tucker’s helmet, asks his dad if he can go play with the cats. Tucker puts him down and he immediately goes in to sit with Wash, who introduces every single cat to him. The one Caboose is stealing is apparently Alpha, the oldest one, and the one that keeps trying to seduce Maine is Sigma. The rest are all just impossible to name to you, because they keep zipping around. One of the little kittens starts trying to nibble on your toes. Donut steals her away, cooing over how cute she is.

You and Lopez can all at least agree on one thing. You’re both more dog people.  
Which helps, because South whistles and suddenly Caboose is trying to steal a Doberman as well as a cat. Alpha gets to escape, but the dog is trapped-and pleased about it, because he starts licking Caboose’s helmet visor. Caboose squeals with delight.

“Hey, Caboose, let Freckles go please.” Huh, so South did remember some names.

“His name is Freckles?” Caboose asks, refusing to let go of the Doberman.

“Apparently. It’s what he responds to. But he’ll respond to just about anything if you say it right.” South says, and apparently “Freckles” recognizes her because he starts kicking his feet at Caboose and squirming until the blue soldier lets him go. South starts sputtering as her pet Doberman tries to lick her face too.

You know the feeling. You spend the entire night that night trying to learn to sleep on your stomach because one of Wash’s stupid fucking cats keeps trying to eat your hair. At least you get a room…sorta to yourself, because the hotel had enough space for everyone. Sarge is sleeping on the bed on the other side of the room, perfectly straight and still and occasionally mumbling something in his sleep.  
When you get up in the morning, you realize you somehow fell asleep the same way. Except there’s a kitten sleeping on you. Sarge is already up, but the sky outside isn’t casting too many beams of light through the boarded up windows, so you opt to not move.  
Hey, don’t be too cruel to yourself. You might actually be a cat person after all.


	23. Kimball

On the bus ride back from Armonia, it is unnaturally quiet. There’s not much to say, after all.

You arrived at the mall late the next morning, and Palomo tried to call up to get the attention of his friends or of this Kimball lady. Instead of a response, he found a large hole in their perimeter. The Dakotas confirmed that this had not been there the last time they went by, and it couldn’t be a good thing.

Not to worry, though. Kimball and most of the children she had with her were okay. However-and there is no easy way to say this, two of the kids had been bitten-and not in a way that could just be cut off, bitten right in the neck. When you found Kimball, she explained that Cunningham and Rogers had tried to go out to look for Palomo and just found a hoard, bringing it back with them on accident. What’s worse, Kimball didn’t have enough ammunition left to put them down after dealing with the hoard that broke in-the two boys had become zombies, now imprisoned behind a security gate. When you walked in, she thanked you for rescuing Palomo, and then asked to borrow a gun for two minutes. Two loud blasts of a shotgun later, she agreed to talk.

At least, she agreed to talk until Doyle started talking. The two spent a good five minutes arguing about what was best for the kids. Doyle had been out looking for someplace safer for all of them, Kimball had stayed to keep the group of students safe. You learned pretty quickly that these two teachers just didn’t get along, not in the slightest.

Also, you learned something new about Palomo. He and the two zombie boys had left to try and find emergency supplies for one of the other kids, Bitters, who accidentally gave himself food poisoning. When you look over to see which one is Bitters, you swear the universe is fucking with you. It’s literally just a younger, slightly more in shape Grif. He even wears orange. Funnily enough, they also do the same thing you guys do at the base-everyone has one color that they wear. The one in maroon is a scrawny girl, hair braided into pigtails. She has the same large glasses that you do-yours are a bit squarer, though.

But you’re getting off topic. The more important topic is survival. Kimball and her kids certainly were surviving, but barely. Especially with winter coming any day now, there would be no chance for these guys to pull through with what little they have-the problem isn’t food or anything, there’s plenty of that, but power. The mall is dying, and if it goes out, they will all freeze to death. This place isn’t weather resistant at all.

So really, who was going to say no to Caboose’s idea of them coming with you?

Actually, quite a few people, once a new little bit of information was arisen-one of the other kids had a bite. It was a small wound, just a nibble on the wrist, but Kimball didn’t have the supplies to treat it. It was several days old, which did not increase the morale of the group. The maroon girl hung her head lower, leaning into the side of a girl decked in pink. Her arm was bandaged.

Kaikaina was the one who put her foot down and said she wasn’t letting the bus go anywhere without these kids. You knew why.

And that’s about where things ended in the mall-everything that could be salvaged was taken and loaded up into the top racks of the bus, the only thing left behind being the dead. You swung by and grabbed Wash’s cats on the way out, which seemed to make the student’s a little happier-people like cats, after all.  
You learn the maroon one’s name is Katie Jensen. You strike up a conversation with her and her lisp for a little bit, because she’s in the back with you and her friend is asleep and she starts crying. She’s scared and a little embarrassed, but for the most part, she’s scared about getting her arm chopped off. You tell her about your leg. You actually go through all the effort to take off your leg armor and show her the prosthetic Lopez made you. You swear, from a little ways away, Lopez is smiling at your description of how awesome it actually is. You aren’t lying when you say that, the fake leg has been really good to you.

You try to talk to Bitters, but you can’t. Tucker can, but you have to move away. Even his voice sounds similar, it’s horrible. It’s not his fault, you know that, but still.

Instead, you find yourself sitting near a kid named Matthews. For a good moment, you wonder if you somehow had a younger brother-but you know that’s not possible. You like him though. It’s really easy to relate to this kid, for some reason or other.  
On the quiet ride back, it becomes night at some point. You think you might be cursed, because Matthews falls asleep on you like Doc did, but he slides from your shoulder and almost smacks his face into the armor of your leg, which wakes him up, and he apologizes five times before you just let him have the seat to himself, moving up front. You have a pressing question for Kaikaina that nobody else has asked yet, but the answer is no, she’s fine, she doesn’t need anyone else driving the bus, she won’t be able to sleep anyway.

The two of you end up being the last ones awake, in the end. Even the vigilant freelancers crash. In the rearview mirror, you swear you see wash in the middle of a man sandwich with York and North. Hell, even Sarge has the telltale tip of his otherwise stationary body, giving away that he is also at least dozing a little. Maybe there’s just something about the dark and the quiet that makes people tired.

When you finally get back to the base, Kai offers you a bottle of vodka to honk the horn to wake people up. It works all too well, because South starts yelling obscenities immediately.  
Everyone immediately jumps up when Junior copies her and yells out “Fucking mornings!” Tucker and Wash look about to have a heart attack. You and Kai exchange an amused look as South grabs Junior and carries him out of the bus, cheering loudly.

Of course, you both share a different look when the last person off the bus is the younger version of the person the two of you are missing.


	24. The room

“Hey, cupcake.”

“Yeah?”

“So, um, I know it’s only been a while since we got here an all-”

“South, don’t tell me you’re leaving!”

You can’t help but perk up a little bit at the sound of Donut whining. It’s hard not to, his whine is so high pitched he could pass for a dog whistle.

“What? No, no, just the opposite. We’re staying here much longer, apparently.” Fuck. Okay, it’s not like you aren’t happy to have people in the base-it’s refreshing to have new faces around!

There’s something to be said about gaining fourteen people at once, though.  
It’s only been a week, you know better than to assume this is how things will be forever with so many people around. All the same, you can’t help being annoyed about how the schedule seems to have worked out.

You wake up early in the morning, get something to eat, go up and sit on the wall like you did every morning. You only get five minutes before any random freelancer comes over and asks you what you’re doing. Some of them join you and try to have a conversation which is basically them talking at you and you occasionally replying with sarcasm or sincerity. This morning, Wash tried to get you to talk about how things were going with the reds. It was a transparent attempt to ask how you were handling Grif’s death, just like a lot of things are. Wash thinks he’s an expert on this sort of thing, now that he’s helping Tucker and Kaikaina through it too.

You come off the wall and spend the entire day trying to find something to do that nobody else takes off your hands for you. Something needs to be moved across the base? Don’t you worry Simmons, Maine will carry that for you. Oh shoot, some menial chore? Matthews did that an hour ago. Rations need replenishing? No worries, the freelancer crew has this, they’ll get what you need and more.

Today, you spent hours in your room wondering if anyone would notice you not walking around the base. After about two hours of dicking around, you realized this plan might backfire entirely and make Wash think even more that you need therapy. The new doctor lady, Emily Grey, is legitimately terrifying to you-so no matter what, Wash isn’t making you sit in a chair in close proximity to her. The only time you’ve gone near Grey is to check on Jensen after she got her arm chopped off. Girl’s handling it pretty well, all things considered. You’ve offered to help her with anything she needs, since you’re really the only person on base who’s been there and done that. She’s also got her friends, and Volleyball-you discovered recently that Volleyball and Jensen are actually dating and not just really close gal-pals. They are cute together, actually. Also, Lopez seems to either really like Jensen or just hate her least of all, because he not only made her a new arm, but spends time teaching her how to use it. Jensen’s very good at fixing up vehicles, apparently-she says her mother owned a mechanic shop and she showed her how to fix up cars. Lopez is just happy that he has someone else who can fix up the vehicles-well, happy in the Lopez way. The guy is never really “happy”.

You’ve spent most of the nights letting everyone else clean up the now crowded dinner room and going back up to watch dusk. Lately, it’s been Kaikaina who joins you. Neither of you know what to say, so you don’t say anything. Yesterday, she tried to do the most Kaikaina thing possible-she kissed you. It lasted a few seconds, and both of you really tried to make some sort of connection that would make this easier. It didn’t work. She sat back on her hands, cursing, and you leaned forward onto your forearms. She apologized. You told her there was no reason for her to. The both of you still didn’t know what to really say-how do you console the little sister of your dead best friend?

Better yet, how do you get Donut to stop whining?

“Then what’s the problem, South?” Oh, you should probably mention this too. Florida and South have gotten into a competition over who gets to spend more time with Donut. It’s the most peculiar thing to watch, really-individually, South and Florida are weird motherfuckers. Together, the two of them are the people from every peer pressure warning video ever. But with Donut? None of that matters. Florida is like a weird feminine uncle, and South is the butch lesbian to Donut’s effeminate gay.

“Well, I’ve spent like four days sleeping on the red team’s couch anyway, and can’t help notice that you have an empty room-” Wait. An empty room?

“Oh, that’s not…empty, really, that was Grif’s old room!”

“Who’s Grif?” She asks, and you can practically imagine the look on Donut’s face as he glances around, hoping not to see anyone. You’re not sure why, it’s not like mentioning that Grif is gone is going to make anyone (you) have a mental breakdown.

“He was a member of our team, but he…” He drifts off, and you quickly tug on your fake leg and move up to your door, leaning on it to hear the conversation better.

“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry!” wow, South actually sounds remorseful. More than your teammates did, at least. You have to admit, you like South a little. The first day she was here, she declared that she would not room anywhere near her “dumb gay douchecanoe of a brother” because of one very specific reason: she was sick of seeing his giant nose every time she had a morning coffee. You’re surprised that she isn’t forcing herself into the blue half of the base, since Church stole all the coffee machines you bummed from the mall. You’ve never seen him so happy in your life. Actually, you’ve never seen him happy in your life. You suspect that South might be avoiding the blue base because of Wash spending time over there. Actually, Wash has been with the freelancers much more lately. What’s the worst part, it’s like he switches between two different people-the wise (and bossy) freelancer you had all gotten used to, and the weird nerdy guy the freelancers know. The easiest way to see this difference is to put Tucker and a freelancer in a conversation with Wash-he bounces back and forth between speech patterns to Tucker and his old friends like nobody’s business. South was the one to point this out, after she tried to give Tucker a black eye for making some dumb pick-up line at CT (who loved it, just for the record). Wash kept Tucker from getting a black eye, but almost got one himself from Tucker.

“See, you get me?” Oh, right, the conversation. Don’t get distracted, Simmons.

“Hey, it was only a suggestion.”

“Well, I mean, I personally wouldn’t mind-Grif isn’t using it, after all, but I have a bad feeling moving in would make the rest of the team mad.” Moving in? Oh no, she’s not trying to do what you think she’s trying to do, is she?

“What are you guys doing?” You can’t help it, you burst out of your own room and lean on the wall outside. Donut looks incredibly guilty. South gives you a welcoming jerk of her head.

“Oh, don’t worry about it! South just wanted to know if she could have Grif’s old room, because he isn’t using it anymore and stuff, and I-”

“No.”

“I-wait, what?” Ah, you get the game now. Donut was hoping that you would agree, and South would get the room. He blinks a few extra times, the fiend.

“No.” South doesn’t look too unnerved by your blatant shutdown.

“But-Simmons, where else is she-” Donut starts to protest, and you just open the door to Grif’s room and push him in, closing the door while South leans against the opposite wall to wait.

“Donut, listen. She can’t have this room.”

“But why not? It isn’t being used anyway, why not let her have this room?”

“You can’t just give Grif’s room away to the first person who asks for it!”

“It’s South! She’s practically a red, Simmons, her armor is even pinkish!”

“It’s not about color, Donut!” You yell, and hope he doesn’t retort with some variation of how that’s racist. He waits for you to make your point, but you don’t have to.

“You still think Grif is coming back, don’t you?”

“Fuck you.”

“Simmons, he’s dead. He’s not going to magically appear and want this room back!”

“Shut up! You don’t know that!”

“You watched him die!”

“No, none of us watched him die! That’s just it, we have no idea what happened to him!”

“Eaten by zombies, duh.”

“Right, right, eaten by zombies who can apparently chew through fucking armor.”

“You’re still on about that? Jeez, Simmons, we’ve been over this-”

“No! No we haven’t! That’s the goddamn problem, none of us have fucking talked about this shit!” You can’t help it, you’re yelling.

“Simmons-” oh, Donut, why do you have to have the large doe eyes? It’s hard to be angry, really-he didn’t mean any harm, you know that. You exhale loudly, dragging a hand down your face.

“Just…no. Tell South she can’t have this room. I don’t give a shit.” You turn away from him and set your ass down in a stolen swivel chair Grif owned, spinning it to face the window so you don’t watch Donut leave. He leaves with the little pad of his feet.

Silence.

You breathe a few times, long and loud.

More silence.

“Hey. You.” Oh no, here comes South. You feel a cold rush of fear run down your spine as you anticipate her beating compliance out of you. You spin around to face her, and she’s just sitting on Grif’s old bed, cross-legged.

“Sorry, couldn’t help overhearing-” you immediately turn the chair back around.

“I’m not changing my mind.”

“I didn’t expect you to. In fact, if you did, I’d be genuinely shocked.”

“Then what do you want?”

“Tell me about this Grif guy. Must’ve been close, right?”

“You…could say that.” You turn back to her.

“What, were you two in love or some shit?” She jokes, and you almost chuckle.

“No, despite what Donut says, we weren’t…we weren’t like that. Just friends, really.”

“Well, Donut hasn’t told me anything about him. Could still be too early, we have only been here a fucking week, you know.” She shrugs, and puts her hands up behind her head.

“Grif…was the worst person I ever met.” You have no other way to say it, honest.

“Go on.” And you do. You tell her. You tell her the basics of what Grif meant to this base. To you. You omit the kissing, though. She doesn’t need to know about that just yet, and besides, Donut will just tell her later anyway.

You tell her about how he died.  
South agrees that there is no way zombies could kill a man in body armor so quickly. She thinks he might have been knocked unconscious and then…  
You’re no longer sure what is worse-Grif dying, or you having left Grif to slowly die.

“Have mine.” You offer, switching away from thinking about Grif’s death before you get emotional. You aren’t an emotional guy, but anyone could get carried away thinking about leaving their best friend to slowly be eaten alive.

“What?”

“Have my room. I’ll move all my stuff out, move it over here. You can have my room.”

“Simmons, you sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure you’re fucking sure?” You do laugh, just a little at that. You finally meet her in the eye.

“Yeah. Just so long as you don’t let Donut paint it pink, okay?”

“I’ll make him paint it black as the void before I let him do pink.”

“I’d love to see the look on his face if that happened.”

“Hey, give me an hour and a can of paint, let’s motherfucking do this.”

“At least let me move my stuff out first?”

“Fair. Go get your shitty junk out of my room, Dickbiscuit.” She shrugs, getting up.

“Dickbiscuit?”

“Still thinking of a nickname for you.” She mutters, exiting out into the hallway.

You go and pack up your things.


	25. Garbage and baggage

Of course, packing up your things doesn’t mean you’re going to unpack them.

Grif’s room is a fucking mess. You don’t really understand why you didn’t just give South this room the second you move into it, because Grif did not treat this place well in the slightest. In fact, you end up having to pay Donut to help you clean this place up. Actually, you pay him to shut up about the fact you were so adamant on leaving this place alone and now you want it cleaned. He brings Caboose to help, and Caboose brings his new shadow, Smith. Smith has done nothing but follow Caboose and act all inspired by everything Caboose says. He actually believes that Caboose is wiser than anyone else at this base, and his wisdom is being underappreciated. Caboose just likes having a friend who actually likes him back for once.

You’re partially glad Grif is dead, because if he wasn’t, you would absolutely be getting Lopez to beat him with a wrench. Never underestimate Grif’s ability to both somehow have pizza and to somehow have pizza in weird places you don’t expect. Honestly, be glad it’s cold outside and all the bugs are dying off, otherwise this room would be full of roaches.

You do have to stop at one point, though. Caboose ended up adopting South’s dog, Freckles, and it also follows him everywhere. Freckles ends up walking in and trying a bite of pizza. You have to immediately take him to Doc and Grey (you swear, you don’t want to know what those two were doing before you walked in, but it totally involved Grey in-between Doc’s shins. Donut gets this weird look to him, but you’re just thankful pants are still on and nothing looks sexual) and make sure the dog didn’t accidentally poison himself. Caboose won’t leave Freckles, Smith won’t leave Caboose, and Donut just wants to stay to be of help. So it’s you against the pigsty, in the end. At least, until South finds out what you’re doing and tells Florida, who immediately comes over to help. He ends up being as helpful as Donut, actually.

When the room is in livable condition, you feel tired enough to crash and go to sleep, but get rudely awoken by the sound of CT rummaging through things. It’s what she does, she looks through everyone’s personal shit when they aren’t looking. The only reason you catch her is because she starts laughing at something. She won’t let you look at it though-some crumpled up piece of paper. She has pockets stuffed with similar papers, and messes up your tired hair before leaving the room. In your only partially awake state, you aren’t too bothered by her. But Grif’s door does creak obnoxiously, and it wakes you fully, so you try to hunt her down to read them. You can’t find her, Donut can’t find her, South can’t find her, but according to Kaikaina CT is hiding in what she calls the “sex closet”. You decide it might be easier just to not wonder about the papers anymore.

By the time dinner rolls around, you’re ready to go back to sleep. Except you can’t. Wash and Maine come back from an outing in the city with a goddamn keg of beer and the intent to fucking drink it all in one go. They claim it’s because they found it cold and don’t want to risk it getting warm in any way. You don’t want to question what place still has a working freezer. You don’t really want to be social or to drink. Four beers later, however, you’re still sitting here and listening to freelancer banter.

“Don’t fucking blame me, it was all North’s fault!”

“North wasn’t even there, he was a mile away!”

“How the fuck would you know? You were looking the opposite direction!”  
And so on. You don’t know the context for much of this, but you’re delightfully buzzed and content to listen to their discontent.

At least, until Junior walks over. South cheers and welcomes the “little guy”, but thankfully doesn’t try to offer him a beer. Junior shyly smiles at her before moving over and tugging at Wash’s shirt sleeve.

“What is it, bud?” Wash asks, and as he turns to help Junior Florida steals his beer and downs it in a few thirsty gulps. Florida has been on a roll tonight, intent to get drunk off his ass. Junior kinda shuffles his feet.

“Can you…dad” He doesn’t say it like that, he’s old enough to use complex sentences, he just says it so quietly that that’s all you hear of it. Hell, even Wash doesn’t hear it.

“What was that?”

“Can you go talk to my dad?”

“Sure. What does Tucker want?”

“He thinks you don’t like him anymore, he’s upset. Can you go talk to him?” Junior says, a bit louder. Wash’s reaction is priceless: his mouth snaps shut, his eyes bug out a little, and dear god is he blushing or are you just drunk? York takes a chug of beer for the sole purpose of doing a spittake, and South hands her beer to Wyoming so she can double over in laughter without spilling. Maine cracks a huge grin behind the rim of his beer cup, intently watching as Wash tries to redeem himself.

“Excuse me, guys, there’s…something I need to take care of, real fast, be right back-” Wash mumbles, standing up and following Junior off.

“Good luck with your boyfriend problems, Wash!” CT yells after him.

“Shut up!” Wash yells back. “We aren’t…thing!” no, you didn’t miss a word or two, Wash literally just yells thing and then groans, tuning out the laughter of the freelancers as he goes to talk to Tucker. You take another swallow of beer before you lean closer to Doc to joke.

“Wash would have better luck getting Tex to admit her feelings than Tucker, no?” Doc almost chokes, because he has an obnoxious laugh that requires a full windpipe before he can do it.

“Wait-what did you just say?” CT asks.

“Oh, just…nothing.” You respond, hoping she doesn’t press.

“I could’ve sworn I heard you say Tex.” CT says with raised eyebrows, taking a drink.

“Tex? As in, like, Texas? What, no, I don’t know any Tex.”

“Then how would you know Tex is a person?” Wyoming quips.

“State name guess?”

“You’re not a very good liar, are you?” South jeers, slamming back the rest of her cup and setting it down empty. “So c’mon then. Did you know Tex?” Donut, who’s sitting next to her, frantically shakes his head.

“No.”

“Bullshit.”

“I must’ve just…overheard the name somewhere. From Wash, before you guys showed up. I don’t know her.”

“Then how would you know she’s a lady?” fuck. Busted. You should never drink again, you’re already a bad liar, being buzzed doesn’t help!

“Look, she left weeks ago.”

“Only weeks?” Asks Florida. Donut is glaring at you, trying to get you to shut up.

“Guys, I hate to be that guy, but…if Tex is still alive, Carolina needs to know.” York says, solemnly. The freelancers all get quiet. They take drinks.

“Fuck that. We don’t even know where she is.” North mutters.

“We have to tell her anyway. She can come to us if she wants to.”

“You think she’ll come back after the stunt you pulled?” Wyoming grunts, and York almost stands up, but is held down by Maine. You take a sip of your drink.

“Nicely done, Simmons.” Doc mutters as the freelancers bicker. You elbow his gut.

“Shut up. It was only a matter of time before Church brought her up anyway.”  
Speaking of Church, he walks on over as if on invisible cue, with Junior in tow. How he manages to be on perfect timing, you'll never know.

“Hey assholes. Apparently Wash and Tucker are fighting. Pass me a beer.” He groans, taking a seat in the circle. North gets him a glass and offers Junior a space to sit, which the kid takes. Junior looks sad, as if he wants to be crying or something right now.

“What happened with them?” South asks, eyes flitting between Church and Junior. Junior stares at the ground. Church lets out a belch before answering her.

“I don’t know. Wash came over, the two of them started talking about you motherfuckers, someone hit a nerve, and now I have to deal with two scared children-one of which I am capable of dragging over here, the other one of which I pawned off on Smith.” Church shrugs.

“Are they okay?” York asks, leaning forward slightly.

“Nothing’s being thrown, but I’m tired of the bitching. If you wanna go check on them, be my fucking guest.” The freelancers all glance among themselves, but you’re the first one to stand up. Let Church be the one who gives away the information on Tex, you’re going to do what Grif would have wanted: watch a couple fight.

“Simmons? You’re going to go check on them?” Donut gawks, as if this is impossible news.

“Fuck that, I’m gonna go make popcorn and watch this shit.” You say back as you start to walk off toward the blue half of the base. You meet up with Kaikaina, who is shrouded in shadows outside the lounge area of the blue base, a perfect vantage point for watching without being seen. You wonder how long she’s been there. You wonder why she’s there, even, but don’t ask. You make a mental note to ask how she found this spot later: you assume it has something to do with creeping on people, but you’re still curious enough to wonder.

If it’s a fireworks display you want, oh man, is it a fireworks display you get.

You have no idea what they are yelling about. You get that it has something to do with Wash acting different around the freelancers vs around Tucker, and how Tucker is sick and tired of Washington (he says the full name, even) treating him like an underling and them like equals. Wash insists that Tucker is blowing this out of proportion and that he has a different relationship with his friends.

That’s when Tucker finally asks the big question. You are so glad you are here to watch this.

“Then what am I to you, David?” oh, a name you didn’t even know. Wash tries to compute or something, because he doesn’t seem able to come up with any response, and Tucker prompts a quicker answer with an enforced “huh?”

“Lavernius, c’mon.” First names, oh boy. You can’t wait to…not tell anybody about this, because the person you automatically think of is not around anymore.

“Answer me!”

“Why are you making such a big deal out of-”

“Oh, if it’s not a big deal, fucking answer me!!” Tucker yells, and when Wash still can’t respond, he crosses his arms and taps his foot. “Well?”

“Look, Tuck-”

“Yes, Washington?” Tucker responds, a bit colder. Wash just scoffs.

“You know what, I can’t say I’m surprised by this, Lavernius.” Oh no. “You just have to be the center of goddamn attention, don’t you? Get jealous all you want, they’re my friends and I don’t have to apologize for being around them!”

“I’m not jealous of your friends, Wash!”

“Oh really? Because this childish display totally makes me believe that!”

“Why are you being such a dick about this?”

“Why have you been avoiding me and sulking for the past week?”

“I’m not avoiding you!” Tucker screeches.

“And I’m not being a dick about this!” Wash screeches back, higher pitched. You really wish you had popcorn, this would be so perfect with popcorn.

“Yes you are!”

“Okay, so maybe I am. So what? You were a dick first!”

“What?”

“You didn’t even try to talk to the other freelancers, you’ve been holed up with the rest of the blue team bitching about me without even trying to get to know them!” Wash is actually quite true. Tucker has been getting more distant…and more annoying. It’s about time someone called his bullshit.

“Because it’s just…Christ, nevermind, forget this whole thing.” Tucker curses, grabbing at his hair and turning away from Wash.

“It’s just what?” Wash asks, somewhat harshly. Tucker sighs heavily and shakes his head. “It’s just what?” Wash asks again, softer this time. Tucker lets out a loud curse word behind his palms.

“Forget it, Washington.”

“I can’t fix whatever it is that’s bothering you if you won’t tell me what it is.”

“It’s gonna sound like a goddamn romance movie if I say it.” Oh?

“We are alone, you know. Besides, we already kinda are…you know.” Oh. OH.

“See, that right there, that’s what I’m talking about! You’re super fucking open with your friends, but whenever it comes to me or the guys, it’s all secrets and lies!”

“I thought that’s what you wanted-”

“Dude, nobody here cares! Everyone’s fucking partially gay anyway!” You and Kaikaina exchange a look of mutual excited shock, and you instinctively cover your mouth with your hands.

“So you throw a fit just because you want my attention?”

“Well, when you put it like that-”

“Tucker, you could have just said so.”

“I did when you moved out!”

“That was practically a month ago!”

“What, you can’t remember me saying a thing from a month ago? Fuck that, you’re supposed to be the smart one here!” Tucker doesn’t sound quite as angry. In fact, he laughs through the f on his f-bomb, cracking a somewhat smile. Wash returns it.

“Pay attention to the way they look at each other when they aren’t talking.” Grif told you once, when you put up the binoculars he gave you and took a turn spying on Tucker and Wash. He took another bite from a stale bag of chips. “They do this thing where they look at each and half-smile. It’s their biggest giveaway, really.”

“Even though Tucker’s just bitching about doing exercise again?”

“Hey, it’s how their relationship works. Wash forces Tucker to work out, they fight, they cool off, and then they fuck.” Grif said through a mouthful of chips.

“They do not fuck.”

“They totally fuck. That half smile is a signal for a popped boner.”

“Get your head out of the gutter!” You remember snapping at him, putting the binoculars down and stealing the chips to eat a few yourself. You remember Grif saying something else, you’re not sure what, and patting you on the back to wipe away the crumb stains on his fingers. He always used you as a napkin before he touched the binoculars again. Most of your shirts still carry the stains.

You think maybe he was on to something with his smile-boner theory, because Wash and Tucker totally aren’t fighting any more. Kaikaina has perked up, grinning from ear to ear. You feel a little immoral for still being around while these two get personal, so you stand up and leave.

“Simmons! Everything okay?” Donut asks as you come back to the circle.

“Oh yeah. Hey, Junior, don’t worry about them, but maybe give them a few minutes?” You tell the kid, because when you say don’t worry, he immediately starts to get up.

“Why? What are they doing now?”

“Being gross.” You earn a round of freelancer chuckles as they get what you mean by that.

That night, after many more beers, you go back to Grif’s room. You look through a few drawers until you find those dumb binoculars again-they aren’t even good ones, one of the lenses has a weird tiny chip in an annoying spot, and there’s nothing for you to even be looking at with them.  
All the same, you fall asleep with a smile on your face, binoculars on the mattress beside you, and a permanent stain on your shirt.


	26. Death at a funeral

For this chain of events, you could blame anybody.

You could blame the mild hangover you had this morning. You could blame the blues for hoarding all the coffee. You could blame Florida and Wyoming, who were getting it on in the kitchen before you walked in and only stopped when you asked them not to keep going while you were in the room (note to self: find bleach). You could blame South for acting like this was a normal occurrence for the two of them when you told her about it (or blame Donut for pressing for details). 

Hell, you could even blame Sarge, but you won’t. You blame two people: Bitters and Matthews.

Why the universe seems to think that you haven’t suffered enough with losing Grif, you don’t know. All you do know is that the world is cruel, and Bitters and Matthews make you want to scream. Or tear your hair out. Or both. Earlier today, they were watching the dawn, sitting in the spot on the wall you and Grif occupied for dusk, Bitters eating something for breakfast while Matthews went on and on about something. The two of them almost started fighting, but one cracked a joke and they laughed instead.

The early morning light might be different, but fuck if it isn’t still that weird shade of romantic. Like dusk was. You couldn’t help but always fondly remember dusk.  
“Hey, Simmons?” fuck, you couldn’t help but remember dusk in general, could you?

“What?”

“Why do we sit here every night?”

“Because this is a nice spot on the base wall, you dumbass. Perfect view, not too exposed, and this section is thick enough where you can lie back and not fall off the wall.”

“No-Why do we spend our evenings staring at the sun?”

“Because it’s…pretty?”

“No, I mean, isn’t this really bad for your eyes?”

“Fuck it, I’m already legally blind without my glasses.”

“But if you junk up your eyes more now you won’t be able to get your prescription fixed.”

“To be honest, I don’t really care.”

“Why not?”

“I have those transition lense things, my eyes are protected. What’s your excuse?”  
You remember he didn’t have an excuse. At least, not one he said out loud.

The freelancers wouldn’t stop talking about Tex, either. It actually broke a rift between most of them-something not even teasing Wash could help repair. You don’t know what happened, but it wasn’t good. You think back to the last thing Tex asked you, though. With all the mentioning of her, you can’t help wonder what she meant by the whole “why are you still here” thing.

So yeah. A combination of Bitters, Matthews, and Texas drove you to do this. That, and finding a good shovel in one of the storage closets.

You’re going to give Dexter Grif a proper funeral.

Getting back to the train station is easy, it just takes a long time. You leave in the early morning, and by the time you walk there it’s early afternoon. You sorta regret not taking a car, but at the same time, you didn’t want to give the team any real reason to come after you other than helping you bury Grif. You take a long pause once you get to it (actually, you take a nap. It’s what Grif would have wanted) and clamber on in. Alone, you don’t have to worry about the zombies down here. You’re in the same full-body armor that has kept you safe this long-regardless of whether or not it kept Grif safe, in the end.  
The hardest part of this plan of yours is actually finding a place to dig. While you walk to where Grif’s body (whatever is left of it) is, you realize that the entire train station is just tile flooring. Where the fuck are you going to bury his body? You decide you’ll just have to…cover it up with something that isn’t dirt. Grif probably wouldn’t have wanted you to go the extra mile, anyway, and there was plenty of shit in the tunnel you escaped from that could easily put him to rest!

Well, correction. There’s plenty of shit in this tunnel to bury something, but it won’t be Grif.

His body is gone.

He’s fucking GONE.

You shut up the part of you that is screaming that it must mean Grif is…no, no, don’t get hopeful. He was just dragged into a nearby area, that’s it, he was moved.

You check the next four tunnels around this one. No sign of him. Well, no sign of most of him. You find one piece of his armor.

One piece of his armor that immediately has you on your knees and desperately trying not to cry.

Of course it's his helmet. The visor is cracked, but not open. There’s a black stain on the left side of it.

You can’t handle the truth of it. He really is dead. There’s no way he could survive without this helmet, right?

But he can’t be. There’s no way he should have-where is the-he can’t.

He’s gone.

This proof is all you need before you can’t stop yourself from clutching at the helmet, wrapping it in your arms and holding it as close to you as you can.

You cry. You’ll admit it this time. You cry like a baby.

You cry so hard you miss the faint, slow footsteps behind you.

You cry so hard you miss them approach.

You cry so hard, until the back of your head explodes in pain and everything goes dark instantly.

 

When you get back up, your ears are ringing, your face is salt stained, and Grif’s helmet lays on the floor a few feet away from you.

An orange-armored hand picks it up, and you dare to let your mind think the best of things. That is, until you are forcibly rolled on to your back and greeted with the sneer of Felix.

“Well, look who’s finally awake! Wait, don’t tell me, the maroon one…oh! Of course, you’re the nerd who was incredibly gay for the orange one!” Felix laughs, spinning the helmet in his hands. “Doesn’t seem to me like that ended well.”

“Felix.”

“Right, right, get to the point, I know! Geez Locs, you never have any fun!”

“Felix.” Locus repeats with more force.

“Fucking chill, I got this. Hey, crybaby, we have questions for you. Where the fuck is that Tex bitch?” Tex? Goddamn, why does everyone seem to think you know where Tex is?

“I don’t know.”

“Bullshit, she’s with your group. We’ve kept tabs on you guys, but haven’t seen her in weeks now. Where the fuck is she?”

“I don’t know!” You repeat. “She left!” Felix doesn’t like this answer too much, because you suddenly feel him ripping off the armor on your left arm.

“This shit,” he starts, pointing to the under-armor, “is designed to withstand bullets. Yours isn’t as good as the shit we have, but it holds its own. It’s probably super helpful against Zombies, right?”

“Felix, we don’t have time for-”

“I know, I know, we have to be there by sundown, I get it! Stop reminding me every five seconds, Jesus! Well, sorry we can’t stay and chat, loverboy, but we have important things to do. I’d love to fill you in, but I don’t have time to tell you my evil plan, so we’re just going to kill you and call it quits, cool?” Felix smirks, and at first you have no idea what is happening, until he’s cutting at your under-armor with a knife, slicing back and forth, until the material thins down enough for your blood to start seeping through. He goes deeper, and deeper, until you’re howling on the floor and trying to kick at him. He laughs, digging his knife in one more time before pulling away.

“Have fun fighting off zombies!” He calls in a sugary sweet voice that has you sickened, and he and Locus walk away. He kicks at Grif’s helmet as he walks out, but you can’t watch which way they go, because you’re more concerned about your arm.

You’re actually leaking blood. It’s escaping the material and sliding down the outside. It dribbles over the tips of your fingers, and you start to look around you to see if there’s anything you can use as a tourniquet.

You suppose, if nothing else, the tattered clothes of those zombies that are coming towards you could work as a last resort.


	27. An arm and a leg

“Simmons, c’mon, get up.”  
You can’t. You don’t even know what direction up is. The world is swirling, your head is a mess, and you have no idea who is talking or where they are.

“Get up. I did not go through all that shit to have you die on me now!”  
You hear the sound of a hand smacking across your face, and you see the dim outline of a gloved hand, but your face is numb. You don’t feel it.

You’re on the ground, you think. Your upper body is on someone’s lap. Or maybe a box. You can finally tell which direction is up, or is that down? Where are you?

“Simmons, please, I don’t have time to sit around and wait for your dumb ass to wake up!”  
You know that voice. It’s feminine, but low. Hostile. You get a flash of the color black.  
“Tex?” wow, is that what you sound like? You sound horrible.

“Fucking finally! Simmons, we have to leave, you aren’t safe here. Can you walk?”  
Walk? Can you? You can’t feel your legs. You can’t feel your arms, either.

“I’m going to take that expression as a no. Hang tight, I’ll get you out of here.”

“Where’s here?”

“The train station. Do you remember why you came down here?”  
Train station. Tunnels. Grif, the helmet, it’s coming back to you very slowly.

You’re being lifted, suddenly, and feebly reach for the dot of orange on your vision.

“You came here to find Grif. I knew you would eventually.”

“He’s not…” you try to say, but holy fuck the sound of your own voice grates on your ears. Tex shifts the way she holds you, or maybe the world shifts, or maybe you imagine it. The orange blur is suddenly much closer to you, and you realize it’s in your hands. You can’t control your arms. One of them is a different color than the other.

“What happened to…” you start again, but Tex shifts you and you fall silent. The world is spinning, and now it’s hurtling around you. You feel dizzy.

“When I get you somewhere safe, I’ll explain. You won’t be able to process it in this state, anyway.” Tex says, but the sound comes from a different direction than where you think her mouth is. Fuck, what is going on? Why is the world so blurry and dizzy?

“Felix! Felix was-”

“Don’t worry, I know. They’ve been after me for a while now. I can handle those two just fine. You, however, can’t. They totally fucked you over.”  
You scoff, but it causes you to cough for some reason. Wow, has breathing always been this difficult?

“Simmons.” She says.

“Wha?”

“Stay awake this time, c’mon. You keep drifting off.” Drifting off? You don’t remember falling asleep-you don’t remember-fuck, you don’t remember much.

“Where are we?”

“Safe house. Can’t take you back to the base yet, you wouldn’t make it.”

“Make it? What do you mean?”

“Simmons, you’re…well, you’re bitten. Really badly. You’d turn before we even made it halfway there. I’ll probably have to cut it off.” Tex sounds serious. You, however, don’t feel serious at all.

“Okay.”

“Okay? That’s all you have to say about that?”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve lost a lot of blood, haven’t you?”

“Probably.” You say, and you mentally shrug. Physically, nothing happens.

“You’re gonna owe me so much for this.” She mutters to herself. You blink your eyes shut.

“How much do I owe you?” you ask her, but she isn’t there. She’s in another room, cooking something. You can hear the tell-tale sizzle.

“Did you say something?” She yells over.

“Did I blank out again?” you ask after a quick pause, reaching up to touch your eyes. Your right hand has feeling in it, you can feel it.

“Oh yeah. It was a good thing, though. I managed to at least stop the bite from infecting you.”

“Does it really work like that?”

“The zombie thing is a bacterial strain, not a virus. If it was an airborne virus, anyone who got so much as a paper cut would turn. That’s why we worry about zombie bites-the bacteria is in their undead spit. You’re lucky I was there, a clean bite directly to your bloodstream like that would’ve turned you in about an hour’s time.” Tex explains, and you mentally nod.

“So what did you do?”

“I cut your arm off.”  
You immediately look down at your arm, but it’s still there. Tex walks in to the room and is greeted with a confused as fuck look from you, sitting down with a smirk.

“Okay, not literally. I lack the tools to do a good amputation. However, that arm will never work right again. I did cut out a huge chunk of your arm, just for safety.” You look back down at your arm while she talks, investigating the bloody bandages wrapped around it. You poke the palm of your left hand and feel nothing. You poke harder, nothing.

“Shit.”

“What?” She asks, taking a bite of whatever food she’s made, you aren’t looking.

“At this rate, I’m going to lose the entire left side of my body before Christmas!” you earn a laugh from her, and she offers you a bite of whatever it is she’s eating. It’s fried, fried shrimp you think, probably just a little too old-but you’re glad to have it, because compared to your normal meals, old fried shrimp is delicious.

“Why are Felix and Locus after you?” You eventually ask her, stealing yet another bite off the plate. You’ve had like seven of them now, but she doesn’t seem to care.

“Why wouldn’t they be? I’m a hot commodity, who doesn’t want me?”

“I bet you’re glad Tucker isn’t here.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me of him. I swear, if he says another-”

“Bow-chicka-bow-wow.” The two of you say together.

“Yeah, if he says that shit again, I’ll rip his dick off and feed it to Grif.”

“Grif?”

“Yeah, why not Grif? He’ll eat anything.”

“But Grif’s…” you start, and there’s a beat of silence.

“Oh come on, you go all the way to the train station and you still think he’s out for the count?”

“His helmet was there!”

“His body sure as fuck wasn’t, right?”

“Right…”

“…damnit Simmons, you’re supposed to be smart!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?? Why do you have to be so cryptic all the time, just tell me what you mean!!” alright, you may be channeling your inner Washington, because wow your voice is hitting a higher octave than usual.

“Alright, squeakers, calm down and I’ll tell you. First of all, Felix and Locus are after me because of-” she starts once you’ve settled down, only for you to get wound up again.

“Fill me in on that later, is Grif alive?”

“Wow, couldn’t even wait for the long version before asking if your boyfriend is okay.”

“IS GRIF ALIVE?” you’re shrieking, you can’t help it, and before she answers Tex very calmly smacks the side of your face. You force yourself to calm down.

“Yes.” You cover your mouth, not wanting Tex to see the immediate smile that grows there.

“Where is he?” you force your voice to sound smooth and cool. It doesn’t work.

“He’s going to be heading back to your base, soon enough.”

“What? Why?”

“He’s with Carolina. Someone back at your base must have spilled the beans about me, because the freelancers called her in. So hey, congrats on getting your love interest back, it’ll only cost you…”

“Don’t say it.”

“An arm and a leg.”

“Fuck you, Tex.”

“You’re not my type. Maybe if everyone else was dead and you had more to offer me than your scrawny ass.” Tex jokes, finishing off the plate of shrimp.

“I’m the same type as Church.”

“Woah, are you interested in me? I’m flattered, but-”

“No, no, that’s not what I meant!”

There’s a long pause then. Tex gets up to wash the dish, you lay back down on the floor. You can see a dark stain leading to the slightly-bloody tarp you’ve been laying on.

“How did you find me?” you call to her.

“The red team was freaking out over the radio looking for you. It wasn’t really that hard to guess where you had gone.” She answers nonchalantly, and you sit back up in surprise.

“They were worried?”

“Why wouldn’t they be?”

“Doesn’t really seem like them.”

“I almost forgot, guys never show their emotions, do they?” Her sarcasm floods the room, and the blatant tone of it makes you smile.

Well, smile more.

 

According to Tex, you’ll be heading back to the base in the morning. The very early morning. She needs to take you a different route than the way you came, because she can’t risk Locus and Felix finding her. For now, you need to sleep and recover as best you can before the two of you wander back.

It leads to one of the most awkward nights (well, evenings. You go to sleep really early) you’ve ever had.

You fall asleep first-it isn’t really hard for you to crash after all that’s happened with you. In the middle of the night, you remember waking up because of some creak or moan in the wood or the concrete. You’re held by Tex and several blankets, keeping you warm at the risk of feeling just a bit awkward. You know it’s smart of her to do this, but it feels really weird to be cuddled by the freelancer who threatened your life on multiple occasions. However, you won’t complain, because she has very nice muscular arms. You will never tell her this fact, either. You’ll just pretend you never knew she did you this kindness.


	28. Reunion

The first time you saw Dexter Grif, he stood over you triumphantly and put a bullet in a zombie’s skull.

The first time you see Dexter Grif alive again, he’s about seven feet away and looks just as majestic to you as when you saw him through tear-stained and blood-lost eyes. Mostly because you are, once again, short on blood. You need to stop ditching your groups, all it ever does is make you lose blood and limb.

The first time you see Dexter Grif alive again, it is also the same time you see Carolina. She’s like a more intense Tex, with hair bright red and eyes that glare daggers.

You have to give Tex points, she took a bullet for you on this one. Literally. Upon seeing her, Wyoming took a shot. She later beat his ass with his own sniper rifle and threw him ten feet.

On the flipside, Tex should owe you a little bit. After all, without you, the freelancers probably would have (well, tried to) killed her. However, Sarge refused to let them take any more shots with you standing next to her. You two got inside the base thanks to that.

And that’s when Tex cut your arm off.

No warning, no fuss. In fact, if it weren’t for the sudden reactions of the group, you might have even missed it yourself. It’s not like you could feel it anyway, but they didn’t even know you were bitten.

You actually smiled when it happened, because you suddenly felt like a badass. Looking back on that, you’re glad you had a helmet on, because that would have just been creepy.

Doc amputated you for a second time while the freelancers talked everything out. You told the red team the good news, and they…had reactions. Donut was gleeful as fuck, Sarge pretended to be incredibly displeased by this news, but he took the helmet to fix it up. Lopez wouldn’t stop staring at you in horror-you think it might have been the arm thing.

The first time you see Dexter Grif alive again, you wave at him with your new hand, a prosthetic that’s way fancier than the leg. Lopez (and Jensen) made it for you in record time-just under two hours.  
“No sé quién eres o lo que le hiciste a Simmons, pero me gusta.” Lopez muttered to you after he made it. For some reason, you remembered this phrase-despite having no clue what it meant. You thanked him and he…looked proud? It lasted two seconds before you put on the hand and tried to get it to work, accidentally smacking him in the face in the process.

The first time you see Dexter Grif alive again, he waves back at you from behind Carolina, who is having a scream match with Tex. Nobody in the entire base is moving, because nobody wants to get caught in this fight. Yes, it does become a fight. The two start throwing punches and kicks, snarling and yelling. Carolina moves quick, Tex hits hard. They are at least cool to watch, if not terrifying.  
Nobody knows which one of them pulled the knife, but when it’s spotted, suddenly it becomes a freelancer brawl to try and separate the two. It takes the Dakota twins and York to hold Carolina down, and a literal dogpile of the rest of them plus the blues to get Texas to pretend she’s stuck. Tex is locked in the prison area. Carolina is locked away in the freelancer bunks.

Which means everyone’s attention is now on the reunion that’s supposed to happen between you and Grif. You see the sparkles in Donut’s eyes, he’s expecting another scene like Florida and Wyoming had. The kids have probably been fed lies by Donut, because they also have dumb sparkles in their eyes.

The first time you and Grif have a reunion moment, here’s how it goes:

“What happened to your arm?”

“I was bit. Had to chop it.”

“Oh. That sucks.”

That’s it.

Donut actually does start screaming. He can’t handle that being the first thing you two say to each other, especially after you thought Grif was dead.

The thing is, you and Grif know that’s what people were expecting. You two know everyone wanted a big romantic scene, with tears and “I love you”s and everything.

You glanced Grif’s way, and he glanced back, and you both decided to drive Donut up the wall and deprive him of the scene he desperately wanted.

“Well, I’m going to go raid the fridge.” Grif says, not to you. He walks away, and you resist the urge to follow him. Watching Donut lose his mind even more makes it worth the resisted temptation.  
It’s hard, but you are able to spend the entire day avoiding the scene Donut wants.

You give the helmet back-Sarge makes you do it, because you can tell he wants the same thing everyone does. You know your C.O. enough to guess that. Grif says thanks, puts it on, and then you walk away.  
You walk by where he’s lounging in the red base, stuffing his face. You scoff, tell him not to eat the entire supply of food in one go. Grif flips you off. You walk away.  
At dinner, the two of you purposefully sit on other ends of the room.

“Are you mad at him or something?” South asks you very quietly.

“What makes you think that?”

“Donut implied that you two were inseparable.”

“Well, Donut must have embellished. I told you, we’re just friends.” You fake-snap at her, getting up from the table to leave. You know what you’re doing-burying the lead.  
Because fifteen minutes later, nobody else is outside. Just you. Just dusk.

“Finally got Donut to stop grilling me about this. Sorry it took so long.” Grif says as he eventually flops down next to you. This is what the two of you were waiting for-dusk. It’s what you two always had before, and you missed having him for it.  
You totally weren’t waiting for this absolutely not-romantic lighting to have this moment, no way.

“Everyone else still eating?”

“Oh yeah. Relax, we have time.”

“Alright. You start crying first.” You half-joke.

“Are you kidding? Everyone knows you’re the more sensitive one, you’d be the one to start crying.” He points out, and you roll your eyes.

“Fuck you.”

“You cried like a baby the last time you thought I was dead.”

“I thought I had caused that death!”

“Like. A. Baby.”

“Remind me why I missed you again?” you laugh, but you’re smiling.

“So you admit you missed me.”

“Shut up. You knew I would.” You say a bit quieter, looking off toward the sun. Wow, you never realized how bad this must be for your eyes-what you do for romance, you suppose.

“Does this mean you…you know.” Grif whispers, leaning in your space.

“No, I don’t know.”

“The L word.” He says through gritted teeth.

“Lesbian? Neither of us are girls.” You give him a shit-eating grin. You know what he wants.

“No, the other one!”

“Loathe?”

“Love!” he says louder than he means to.

“Oh, right. That one.” You nod. He waits. You keep grinning.

“Say it.” He sorta commands-he’s smiling too, after all.

“Say what?”

“I love you.”

“You do?” you mock surprise, and Grif moves back into his own space, running his hands down his face. You can’t help but laugh.

“You roped me into that one, it doesn’t count!”

“Why not? Why should I be the first one to say it?”

“Because I had a thing I was gonna do if you-”

“I loathe you.” You say, cutting him off. He smiles and shakes his head slightly.

“Ditto.” He says, and finally kisses you.  
You know you don’t have long before people wander outside. You know you should keep up the joke, you’ve already put so much effort into it.

But fuck that. You missed him.

You slide your lips against his, arm hooking around the back of his neck and pulling him closer. He hugs you around the middle, until you’re awkwardly hoisted up and over his lap. Without the cramped car space, sitting like this is actually kinda nice-it’s easy, at least. Somehow, your legs are long enough to wrap around his hips, pressing the two of you as much together as you can be. Both your arms clutch at his shoulders, desperate and longing. You feel a sudden rush of emotion build up in your throat, threatening to claw out into a string of I-Love-Yous.

“I knew it! You two were faking, I knew it!” You and Grif both fling your eyes open, and both of you look over to where Donut and the group are walking out of the kitchen. The two of you glance between yourselves before suddenly, you’re being pushed.

Now, of course, you have a real reason to hate Dexter Grif.

“DON’T FUCKING DROP ME!” You scream from where you now dangle by your ankle off the side of the wall. Grif is trying his darndest to keep you from falling, but he lacks the strength to pull you up.

“Sorry! It was reflex!”

“IT WAS REFLEX TO TRY AND KILL ME?” You shriek.

“Oh I’m sorry, like you didn’t do this months ago!!”

“I hate you!” You yell

“I hate you more!” Grif yells back. His grip is still solid on your left ankle, thank goodness.  
Wait. Left ankle? As in, left leg?

Oh shit.

Like in every animated cartoon, the second you realize the problem, the problem turns into reality. You have to admit, this will be funny later. But for now, you’re falling, and Grif has just ripped your leg off.

So much for romance, right?


	29. You are not a robot

“Ten bucks says the first thing out of his mouth will be “Where’s Grif?”.”

“We don’t have money, Tucker, this is the apocalypse.”

“Wash, c’mon. You’re killing the vibe.”

“Alright, but you’re wrong. It’ll be the second thing he asks, first being “Where am I?”.”

“You’re both wrong. He’s a “What happened?” kind of guy.”

“No way, Tex, dude’s a sap sack. He’ll go like Donut thinks he will.”

“How much you wanna bet?”

“Tex, don’t encourage-”

“I already posted my bet, it’s ten bucks!”

“Nobody has ten bucks! This is still the zombie apocalypse, where are you going to get ten dollars?” well, looks like someone has set off the squeakington. Christ, Wash, tone it down an octave, you’ve got a killer headache and the argument isn’t helping.

“How about ten dead male deer?” Tex, please, don’t encourage them.

“Ew, gross, no.”

“Ten bucks!”

“That’s not any funnier with an explanation.” Oh, who’s voice is that? You’re not quite sure.

You already know where you are. You were on these scratchy bedsheets just a few days ago, you know this is the med-ward. Wash isn’t getting the ten bucks.  
You also already know what happened. You fell off the wall, and now you’re waking up after Grey has presumably patched you up. So Tex isn’t getting the ten bucks either.  
You don’t actually know where Grif is, because your eyes are shut and you are waking up presumably after being knocked out for several hours, so you suppose you should ask where Grif is.  
But Tucker doesn’t deserve ten bucks.

“Where’s my leg?” ends up being the first thing you ask, because you’re already awake and you can feel your prosthetic is gone. Opening your eyes, you’re greeted by exactly who you thought-Tucker, Wash, and Tex-and also…Dr. Grey. Yay.

“Hey Simmons, more importantly, where’s Grif, am I right?” Fucking Wash, you’re lying on a gurney for the second time in a week and he’s still trying to get the ten bucks?

“You tell me. I’m assuming the mess hall, but that’s just a hunch.” The half-smile washes (no that wasn’t intentional) right off his face, until he’s frowning. Tucker smiles instead.

“He actually is, believe it or not. Went off to get a snack.”

“How long was I out? Because if it was less than an hour, I’m going to kill him.”

“You’ve been out for eleven and a half.” Woah, Tex. Yikes. Not the news you were really expecting to hear, to be honest.

“Why the fuck was I out so long?”

“Oh, that’s my fault.” Oh no. Oh no. “We kinda had to do a little poking around in there.” No no no no no. “You’ll find that, on top of a few broken ribs, you’re also down a few organs!”

“Dr. Grey, maybe you should have waited a little-”

“Nonsense, he can probably already feel the falsies, not telling him that his guts have been replaced would just confuse him!” Wait. What? Grey, what are you-  
And that’s about when you realize what death feels like.

Grey must have been expecting this, because she has a bucket in-hand and up to your chin a solid second before you vomit-because you do, you vomit profusely and instantaneously.

“Told you he’d vomit.”

“His guts aren’t even fleshy anymore, how is upchucking even possible?” Tucker asks.

“Well, it’s a mixture of a pump of adrenaline and the fact his body is probably trying to reject the new parts.” She’s right. You feel like you are being clawed up inside. There’s something lodged in your chest cavity and the only way to get it out is to vomit everything.

“Why…” you try to scratch out, but it’s cut off by your own gagging.

“You fell on your stomach, broke a few ribs-which, in turn, punctured a few organs. Nothing I haven’t dealt with before, don’t you worry!”  
You are worried. You are actually terrified. On top of that, you’re pretty sure you’re going to choke on your own bile. You can’t stop heaving, though, except for a few fleeting seconds at a time where you can breathe.

“You okay?” Wash asks when you finally calm down enough to stop puking every time you open your mouth. You wipe your mouth on the back of your good hand.

“Do me a favor?” you ask, looking up at him from the rim of the bucket.

“Yes?”

“Go get me a gun. Kill me. This is awfu-” there’s nothing left to vomit, body, there’s nothing left to vomit! Stop trying to puke, there’s nothing left in there!

“How about you run along and get a glass of water and some saltines, okay?” Grey says in dismissal to all of the onlookers. You’re thankful, because you’re pretty certain you’re sweating and gross-and still fucking vomiting, Jesus Christ how are you still heaving?

“I promise you, Simmons, your body will eventually bond with the replacements. You will not spend the rest of your life trying to throw up your own stomach.” She says with her classic creepy smile, dabbing at your forehead with some cloth or something. You’re more focused on continuing to breathe.

“Oh thank god, you’re alive!” It’s Grif who says it, walking into the room with a tray sporting a water bottle and a few saltine crackers-someone probably pushed the task to him. He’s just wandering in the doorway when he is pushed to the floor by Sarge, who nabs the tray from him and marches over to you.

“I leave you alone for five minutes to use the restroom, and you almost die? Can’t take my eyes off you for a gosh-darn second, can I?” he laughs, taking a seat beside Grey. You try to smile, but can’t.

“I think that’s the end of it for now, sir-” goddamn, don’t ever try to speak again, don’t ever even think to try to speak again, you’re pretty sure you can taste blood by this point, fuck.  
You spit all the abundant saliva from your mouth to the bucket, and sure enough, there’s a red tint.

“Is it supposed to be-”

“Bloody? In my experience, yes. It usually is for a little while. Don’t worry, you’re in no danger from bleeding out! At least, not on this table-we’d move you over to the other one if you started!” Grey starts laughing. Sarge also starts laughing. Grif gets up off the floor and neither of you two laugh.

Sarge and Grey hang around you for another hour afterwards. Grey wants to make sure you won’t die. Sarge wants to also make sure you won’t die. Grif also wants to make sure you don’t die, but it would be nice if you could talk to him for just a few minutes alone. You, however, wouldn’t mind dying right now.  
When Grey finally assumes that you are in no danger of immediate death, she decides to dose you up on a little bit of painkillers and leave you be for a bit. Sarge actually has to argue for them, because Grey insists that a little pain won’t kill you, and it’s not like there are unlimited supplies. Sarge reminds her that you are missing a majority of your organs and an arm, all removed within the same week, so maybe a dose or two won’t screw everything over. She finally gives in, and you are so grateful for it-everything is nice and warm, not as painful.

Sarge, Grey, and Grif all get up to leave. Grif walks as far as the door before stopping, turning around and quietly walking back over to you, as if he doesn’t want them to know he’s here still.

“Hey.” You croak, your throat still raw.

“I will admit, when you pushed me off the wall I always wanted to get you back, but not like…” Grif says, gesturing to you. You shrug.

“I’ll probably have a cool scar, right?” You smile as best you can, and he forces a laugh.

“May I?” Grif, with his hands around the…whatever it is over you, you don’t know the word for it, asks. He looks up at you with worried eyes. You nod, and he takes a look at the left side of your body, coming away with a mumbled curse and an aversion to looking at you.

“How bad is it?”

“Bad.”

“On a scale of one to ten-”

“Ten. Eleven. Fucking a hundred. Fuck, she even replaced part of your skin!”

“She did?”

“Yeah.” Grif is trying to remain calm. You can feel the tension rolling off him in waves, though. He’s…you can’t think of a good word.

“Fuck it, I’m still better looking than you.” You joke, because you are as calm as Grif is…anxious?

“In your dreams, kiss-ass.”

“Shut up and give me the water.” He does so without a comment, and you drink the water so quickly it’s as if you have never had water before this moment.

“I’m waterproof, right?” you ask when you’re done, handing him the glass. He half-smiles.

“Sure as fuck hope so. Still, it’d be funny to watch you internally rust.”

“Funny for you, maybe!”  
He gets quiet, then, and you realize what word you needed. Ashamed. He’s trying not to show it, but he’s lamenting what he did. Or at least, he’s a little sorry for it. You reach up with your fake hand, touch the shoulder of the man who can’t even look at you properly right now.

“You okay?”

“No, no, don’t do that-”

“Do what?”

“Don’t be nice to me. I’ve fucked you over, don’t ask if I’m-”

“Are you, though?” you remember the night you pushed him off. You remember the night you spent crying (like a baby), but he just…wanted you to be okay. You think you get it, now.  
Grif finally looks at you.

“Jesus, what have I done to you?” he hisses before he tugs you forward a little, burying his face in the bony nothing of your shoulder and clutching at your torso. You don’t know what to say. You don’t say anything. You trace patterns into his back with your fingertips. You know he’s crying, though it’s much quieter than you ever managed. You have the audacity to whisper a shush, kissing the top of his head-you almost get a hair stuck in your mouth, on accident.

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay. How can any of this be okay?”

“Okay, you got me there. Okay wasn’t my best word choice. But I’m alive and only in a moderate amount of pain, so all-in-all I think that’s fine.”

“Maybe you need to raise the bar a little.” Grif mumbles, but you can feel a smile blooming. Because his face is still shoved into your shoulder. Might be time to change that.  
And by change it, you mean pull him forward and kissing his forehead. Oh man, you’re so smooth. He bears a mixture of mild shock and slight humor on his face, which you go ahead and just kiss right off. Fuck, at this rate, the only time the two of you are ever going to be able to do stuff like this is when one of you has been injured-you vote Grif next, because you only have two limbs left to lose.

You’re so absorbed in feeling like a Casanova you almost miss Doc walking in and grabbing something from a cupboard. He doesn’t even stop what he’s doing as he walks right past the two of you.

“We put all of Felix’s condoms and junk in the top cupboard to the right. Take it easy on him, Grif, nothing too strenuous.” He says, completely straightfaced.

Without missing a beat, Grif replies “You got it, Doc.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think all of you know what the next chapter will be ;)


	30. Sexy times

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't like reading about sex? Fear not, this chapter has no real amount of plot in it! You can skip this one, if you like!
> 
> This isn't actually that graphic so yes you "kiddos" (please don't actually be a child) can read it.  
> To my adult fans, who have read my smut before and hopefully liked it, I'm sorry. Maybe I could do a oneshot of the smutty stuff, if you wanted?

Joke’s on Doc, though, because you do end up taking the condoms. You tell Grif to take as many as he can, just to mess with Doc. Also, because of another, easier-to-comprehend reason.

You know. The one that begins with y and ends with ou and Grif bang.

You’d love to give a detailed description of the entire thing, you really would. The thing is, if you think on it too long, your face gets flushed up. It’s bad enough that everyone seems to already know it happened, you think you’ll hold on to the more discreet details. Would you like to explain how your entire right side of your body is covered in hickies? Well, Grif isn’t explaining the long and fresh scratches across his shoulders anyway, they kinda explain themselves.

You’ll talk about another first you had last night, though. First time you ever smoked. Sadly, you don’t have lungs, so it didn’t affect you in any way, but it sure was funny to do it.

Grif was curled up against the flesh half of your body, already starting to fall asleep when you remembered where you had hidden those death-sticks of his. They were within reach, you felt pretty cool, and watching Grif’s eyes blow open made fake-smoking totally worth it.

“Holy shit, you can smoke? What happened to that whole “keep your body pure” shit?”

“I’m like, half copper now. I’m pretty sure I don’t have any body left to fuck over.”

“Wait-how did you know where they were?”

“Oh, I’ve…kinda been living in here.”

“Something happen to your room?”

“South.”

“Ah.” With that, he stole the cigarette from you and smoked with his very real lungs.

“Don’t-”

“Simmons, at what point did you put that stick back up your ass? It certainly wasn’t there ten minutes ago.” Fucking Grif. You don’t mean that as in the action of fucking him (again).

“Fine.” You hissed, stealing the cigarette back (it wasn’t that hard), taking a large breath in, and kissing him. It would’ve been cool, if Grif would’ve stopped laughing for a moment to appreciate it.

Before everything happened, when it was just the reds and the blues, the red team (Sarge) would constantly tease you and Grif for constantly pillow talking. Now that you’ve actually gone through the entire pillow-talk routine, you get why they thought so. Even semi-naked (no way you’re sleeping without at least boxers on, you don’t care what Grif says) and gross, the two of you can’t stop bickering for ten seconds. It makes the sex interesting, at least.

“Fuck you.” You remember him saying at one point to a taunt of yours.

“That’s what you’re doing!” Was your oh-so-clever retort. It made him stop for a moment, actually. Apparently Grif expected you to be more passive and less…just as you are normally.

Forget that. You’ll be a bottom but you won’t be a bottom bitch.

Speaking of bottom bitches, the next morning you both are rudely awoken by the sound of Tucker and Donut sniggering. Apparently, they wanted to make you a “congrats on the sex” cake, but the base doesn’t have cake, so they made you a “congrats on the sex” pancake instead. Grif was still passed the fuck out when you opened the door and let their greedy vulture eyes devour how you must have looked post-sex. They mentioned food, and suddenly Grif was right next to you, trying to grab at it, but you’re taller and have a goddamn cyborg arm now, so there was no way he was eating that.

“Whatever, you ate enough last night.” You said curtly before slamming the door on Donut and Tucker. In retrospect, that was much more sexual than you meant, but you don’t give a fuck about it, really. A free pancake is a free pancake, even when decorated in…something red. It tastes like strawberry, so you’re okay with it being on the sex pancake.  
When you see your reflection, you realize how much of a mess you are, and decide to just roll with it. You get some muffled snickers from the very obvious marks all over your neck, but Grif’s embarrassment (actual embarrassment, can you believe that?) is totally worth it.

“Nicely done, dude.” South congrats while she gives you a high five, which you’re not sure is for the sex or for actually walking around the day after the sex. Maybe both? It’s South, after all.

Sarge, however, is the exact opposite of what South’s reaction is. He actually asks to speak with you privately, which you fear is going to be him disowning you and kicking you out from the red team and maybe the base and maybe forcing you into exile until you wither away all alone because you got some, but actually he just ignores the obvious and asks how you’re doing.

Honestly? You’re feeling practically orgasmic.


	31. Nostalgia?

You passed by the tool shed this afternoon. Actually, no. You went back to the tool shed this afternoon.

Supply runs are a bit more often with all the people now staying at the base, but the freelancers have been taking most of them-they can never sit still, those freelancers. In fact, if it wasn’t for a small accident that happened on their last run (Nothing major, just Carolina pulling a ligament in her leg from pushing herself too far-as she has been lately, trying to beat out Tex) they would be out here right now, and not the reds. Personally, you hate it. Sitting around and doing nothing is the most boring thing ever, so you’re very grateful to get the chance to get outside the base for a while.

It wasn’t planned to be on the east side, really. But for fun, you convince Grif to cover for you for five minutes so you can go look at the tool shed. Covering for you, apparently, consists of him following you and cracking jokes about where exactly he first started hearing you scream. It was the third floor of the house, though he assumes anyone around would have heard it. You both go through the front door of the house, and nothing has really changed in it. It still exists in its trashed state, a dirty house on a street of dirty houses.

You weren’t there for that. You were there for the shed. Though really, looking in at it, you’re not sure why. Perhaps you were hoping it would be some sort of nostalgic feeling, or maybe some moment, but it’s just an empty tool shed. There is a bloodstain permanently over the floor. There’s no sign of the dead zombie, though-probably had been eaten at some point over the months and months.

Grif insults you, in the joking way he does. You don’t respond. Instead, you go back into the house.

“Dude, don’t get all depressed on me. Say something.”

But you couldn’t. You didn’t. There was nothing to say about it. Okay, so you did say some words-like, “let’s just go” and “no” when asked if you wanted to talk. You realized on the silent way back to where you were meant to be that it was the first time you and Grif had not been fighting the entire time. It was awkward to be in silence with him, actually, and you kinda wished you had mustered up the energy to at least form words and not hums.

You came back to base with only the things Sarge and Lopez found. Everyone assumed you and Grif had been too busy fighting (or worse) to actually do your jobs, and you felt the disappointment rolling off of Sarge. There wasn’t nearly enough in this haul to say it had been a success, but at least you found something, right?

You found one important thing. This evening, you find that your watch has stopped working.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, this is so short-mainly because I've been very busy lately, but also partially because...well, the end is closer than you think. I'm kinda sad, actually, because it's been a real blast to be writing this! I promise, though, I won't stretch out farther just to try and make it last.  
> This chapter is just a filler, I'm sorry, but I'm prepping for the end. Don't worry, it won't be for another few chapters, but soon.


	32. Rumor has it

“Simmons, Simmons, you won’t believe it.”

“You’re right, coming from you, I won’t.”  
South slaps you in your real arm, in a way that stings. It’s her fault you’re here anyway, she’s the one who yanked you into a side room. No warning, nothing. Then she insulted your fighting reflexes, but that’s not really important.

“Listen, CT just told me the weirdest shit that I didn’t even know.”

“What’d she say?”

“Get this-Tex and Carolina are always fighting, right?”

“Yeah…what’s your point?” you ask, and South looks around the room quickly before leaning toward you.

“CT says she heard Carolina call Tex “Aunt”. Can you believe that?”

“Wait-they’re related??”

“Apparently! I didn’t even know, they never said anything!”

Nobody ever says anything. Except, of course, for CT.

You never hear anything directly from CT-you two aren’t very close. She seems apprehensive about the people here, but she’s nice to anyone that talks to her. It’s always whispers from someone else, who claims CT told them. CT is never wrong, either. It’s creepy, actually, how right she is.

For instance, this. Carolina being Tex’s niece. It makes no sense to you, considering how often the two are at each other’s throats, but CT said so, so it is so.

You hear from Grif, who heard from Tucker, who heard from Wash, who heard from CT, that Carolina’s family is all kinds of fucked up. You hear from Donut, who heard from Florida, who heard from CT, that Carolina’s mother was a soldier. She died trying to combat the outbreak. You hear from Jensen, who heard from Wyoming (seriously, Wyoming of all people!), who heard from CT, that her father lost it after that. He couldn’t live without Carolina’s mother, Allison.  
You hear directly from Carolina the whole situation. You honestly can’t say how you managed to get the freelancer to sit down on a crate early one morning and tell you her whole sob story. Maybe you didn’t convince her, and you are just a step above saying it to empty air.

“CT got around to you, too?” Carolina asked, chuckling a little. At least she wasn’t trying to kill you for daring to ask about the Tex thing. “Yeah. Tex is my mother’s twin sister. They look almost exactly the same, actually. It’s horrible.”

“Did all that really happen?”

“Did all what really happen? Did my mother die fighting? Did my dad lose control and spiral into a depression? Did my dad eventually start recruiting survivors and training them to fight so he could finish what she started?”

“Did it?” you ask quietly. Carolina looks beyond you. Her crimson hair, pulled back into a ponytail, catches a breeze and flutters up like a candle flame. The wind dies down, and it settles.

“Yes. It did. For a while, actually, it did some good. A whole bunch of well-trained people fighting zombies? Looked as if we might actually win.”

“I take it some shit went down?”

“You could say that. The Direc-my dad, he started turning people away that he thought were unfit. Wouldn’t even let them stay for a night, wouldn’t let them have any of our medicine or food, nothing. We eventually decided that enough was enough, and left.”

You couldn’t say anything if you wanted to. You wanted to.

“But Tex…she knew. She knew what he was doing from the beginning, and didn’t say or do anything. She stood by and let my dad essentially kill dozens of people, just because she was his sister-in law. I can’t trust her anymore.”

“Is…is the whole zombie-fighting-army still a thing, then?”

“Oh yeah. The Director has enough influence and power to do whatever he wants by this point.”  
A normal person might think it a bit weird that Carolina didn’t refer to her father as her father. However, you understood why perfectly. Maybe that’s why she told you. You don’t really know.

“CT was right about you.” She said when you were done with that conversation a few minutes later.

“What’s she said about me?”

“Nothing bad.” She left it at that. Probably best you don’t know, maybe.

It doesn’t stop you from asking Grif and Donut if CT has said anything about you to them (or to someone else and around to them, as information coming from her usually does).  
“Nothing nearly as bad as the shit she’s talked about York.” Grif shrugged. When you pressed, he opted to instead tell you about all of York’s shortcomings. You don’t remember half of them.

“Ugh, don’t talk to me about her right now. I’ve been in charge of spreading rumors about people for years now, and she has the audacity to do it better than I do!” You would’ve pressed, but Donut had recruited Florida to…bake something. Florida in a wrinkly apron is no less scary to you than just plain old Florida (not that he’s old or looks old or anything).

Hell, another two days later you hear one about Sarge-well, okay, rephrase that. You hear there was some secret of Sarge’s going around, but when you tried to get someone to tell you Sarge had already learned that someone was snooping through private information and busted out the shotgun. Nobody went outside that day (except for Dr. Grey. Sarge was okay with letting her do her thing).

It’s not like the rumor-mill is something new, by the way. People always talk shit about other people when they aren’t around, it’s what makes you human. You were more-so surprised at discovering the Carolina and Tex thing than anything else, really.  
Well, that and one other thing. It’s not very important, and it doesn’t change anything, but in a way it’s a nice fact that’s fun to know. It was like knowing the answer to a Jeopardy question. According to CT, Lopez does not hate everyone.


	33. Carolina

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: Fixed the wall of text problem, so it's a little easier to read! Sorry about that!

For once, it wasn’t you.

That’s not a very nice thing to say, you know, but after losing almost all your organs and both your left limbs, you’re grateful it was someone else’s turn to be the injured one.

No, it wasn’t Grif. Funny how your mind immediately jumped to him, though. It wasn’t a member of the red team. It wasn’t even a member of the blue team. Not even a freelancer!

You don’t want to start from the beginning. You want to immediately leap into the ending. The ending is much better, even after…

The beginning. Start from there, it’ll make more sense.

The tool shed is a cold place to sleep in.

Okay, wait, no. You’ve already started from there. Honestly, you are the worst story teller. You wish Carolina was telling this one, since the whole thing is centered around her. Start there, maybe.

Carolina was born to and raised by a scientist and a soldier. Years ago, when the outbreak began, her mother went out to fight, trying to protect Carolina and Carolina’s father. She died. Carolina’s father couldn’t handle losing her, and became obsessed with killing zombies. He began training able-bodied people into grand soldiers, starting first with his daughter and her boyfriend. It was a lot easier than expected, picking people up along the way and training them to fight to survive. Soon, they had a large team of upwards fifty, all fantastic soldiers. They found a place to create their own little “home base”, and named their operation “project freelancer”. The whole system worked-until about six years later, when some of the freelancers started noticing that the director would turn away people he deemed unfit to work at all, even though the whole project was meant to help any survivors. People had to basically sell themselves to him, make him interested in what they had to offer. Eventually, he got too picky with the people he picked, and a line was drawn. Some freelancers tried to stand up against this corruption. They were forcibly removed, and led by the now disowned Carolina, who was trying to start the project over on better moral grounds.

See? You are the worst at storytelling.

Things had changed, however. The group of cast-outs had nearly doubled with the addition (really, the subtraction. You may have been more in number, but you were certainly less in skill) of the reds and blues, and with her backstory repeated to a new group came a new desire to get even in Carolina. She wanted justice, and maybe just a pinch of closure with her ridiculous amount of father issues. However, this plan did not happen right away. Maybe it was because she originally spoke of this plan with the freelancers while she was covered in Wash’s cats. Maybe it was because the reds and blues were just too lazy and too unskilled to become any form of hero. Maybe it was a number of things, it doesn’t matter. After a month of persuasion, she eventually decided to take the freelancers and try without you.

“Can’t convince you all to stay, can we?” Donut had asked in a cheery voice, but it was all forced. He was sad, and it was evident in the expression of his voice-echoed by his face, too.

“Sitting around here and letting him get away with what he’s been doing is only getting people killed.” CT had shrugged, saying it as bluntly as she possibly could.

“Nobody we know. Nobody you know either.” Grif had shrugged back, trying to be of help.

“If everyone used that as an excuse, one way or another, we’d all be dead. Starting with your boyfriend.” York had joked back, and Grif agreed with him, like an asshole.

“I, for one, think it’s an outstanding idea!” Doyle had offered, still high on the idea that this whole thing was noble and just.

“Yes, because we all know how fruitless you think people’s lives are.” Kimball hissed back at him. “Carolina, I trust your team, but even with the few additions,” she glanced at you all, the reds and the blues, and you all felt the shame she placed upon you, “do you really think we’ll be able to pull this off? We have no idea how many people the Director has added on, it could be up to hundreds!”

“Well, it’s better than doing nothing.”

“Carolina-” Kimball had started, but Carolina just stepped forward and put a hand on her shoulder. Everyone assumed they had had this conversation beforehand, and said nothing about the very homosexual smile Carolina gave the shorter woman. South and CT wiggled their eyebrows at each other, though.

“Well, we’d offer you any supplies for your little road trip to hell, but you’re practically taking everything we have anyway, so fuck you guys.” Church added a middle finger to his sentiments.

“Serves you right, you don’t even use half the junk!” Tex retaliated.

“Who’s to know after you leave we won’t need it?”

“Don’t be such a baby. Besides, we won’t die. At least, I won’t.” She said this in such a dark voice that nobody, not even Carolina, dared to say anything for a moment or two afterwards. Well, except Junior, who had no fear of Tex and just wanted to hug Washington before he left. The freckled freelancer picked him up, and the kid practically tried to choke him.

“Alright, we’re all loaded. Get ‘er moving, Four-Seven!” Carolina drawled to the driver of the bus, who was someone you hadn’t met before; she showed up the night before supposedly on Carolina’s request. She was an excellent driver, pilot, and according to multiple freelancers, sex partner. You honestly don’t even want to ask.  
The freelancers piled into the slightly more spruced-up bus. Well, except for Wash, who had a child still holding onto him. Junior had a death grip around his neck and stomach with his arms and legs, intent to hold on for dear life.

“Junior, c’mon, let go.” Tucker said as he tried to gently tug his son off Wash.

“Wash, c’mon, let’s get a move on before it gets dark!” Carolina yelled from the bus. York leaned over the front seats and over the small pilot woman to beep the horn.

“Just a second!” Wash called back before actually giving Junior a hug and saying something to him that only he and Tucker could hear. It didn’t do anything, because Junior still wasn’t letting go.

“Junior, seriously, let go.” Tucker said a little harsher, pulling at his son with a bit more force. Junior let out a very loud whine, and when Tucker got a leg off he started kicking.

“Junior, please let go.” Wash tried to stay calm-sounding, but he was also trying to remove the small child from his torso with little success.

“Don’t go! Don’t leave!” Junior screamed, loud enough to probably leave Wash deaf. He kept screaming as Tucker yanked on him harder, enough to loosen him up and, eventually, have those little arms give out on their hold. The moment he let go, Wash smiled at Tucker and turned to leave.

And that’s when Junior kicked Tucker in the very organ that had led to his creation. Hard.

Tucker went down with a loud curse, one arm reaching out to catch Junior’s foot, but it grabbed at a bad angle and Junior yanked free easily, sprinting forward to latch himself to Wash’s legs. Tucker let out another curse and hit the ground with his fist, the rest of him curled inward against the pain. Wash gave a shrug toward the freelancers. Maine lumbered out of the van, and easily pulled Junior off Wash’s leg with his brute force. He could hold Junior in one hand, as he demonstrated very clearly just then, holding the kid up to give him a questioning look. Junior must have had one very painful expression, because Maine set the kid up on his shoulders and shook his head in the direction of the bus. Junior sunk into his bald head, leaning over it until his chin rested just over Maine’s forehead.

The freelancers decided to figure something else out after that.

In the downtime, however, Junior had taken to constantly being around Wash, as if he would vanish if he wasn’t there. It was kinda cute, really, and the almost embarrassed reactions of Tucker trying to get him to stop were entertaining enough for Saturday spy sessions with Grif. Well, it wasn’t really spying. It was just commentary on the shit you already did commentary on, but with alliteration and potato chips. You got to ask Grif about how he had somehow become friends with York, but he followed up with asking how you could stand to be around South for long amounts of time, and the conversation got derailed with the topic of how fucking disturbing Florida was sometimes. Grif didn’t think he was as bad as you thought he was, but he did believe that there was something off about that guy. You pointed out that there was something wrong with a lot of people at the base, and you were about to name-drop some people as examples when Matthews came by. It was almost as if the younger people at the base could sense the imminent dangers to come, because they got clingy. Matthews kissed up to Grif (Grif. Of all the people to start getting attached to, GRIF!), Smith kept hovering around Caboose, Palomo became to Tucker what Junior was to Wash, and then there was Jensen and Volleyball. You aren’t popular with girls. It’s an obvious trait to anyone who ever meets you that you were not meant to reproduce, you were not good with women, it was just how it was. You had accepted that years ago, really. So imagine your surprise when Jensen and Volleyball started hovering around you. It wasn’t any sexual or romantic interest-that would just be gross, it was just…hovering. They were over at the red base more, at first. Then they were more around whatever room you’d be in. You’d turn around and walk out from a place, and the two of them would be sitting outside, shooting the shit. Well, pretending to. Maybe they knew. Maybe they could feel it. Or maybe they were just getting anxious from all the talk of fighting going around the base. It’s not like they were going to be doing, they would just be babysitters for Junior.

And then, one morning, the freelancers themselves broke into two groups. Carolina’s side, which wanted to go after the director now, and Tex’s side, which wanted to wait until they had something more in mind. It wasn’t a fight, per se, it was just a slow splitting of people. It was just a slight thing-a difference in the amount of deep conversations people had with each other. York and North spent less time chatting together. South and CT didn’t stay up nearly every night shooting the breeze. Wyoming cut down on the amount of knock-knock jokes, and Florida knitted a lot more than usual. Donut wouldn’t always be up at the same time any more, and a few mornings he didn’t even eat breakfast, just drank a few glasses of water and waited. Church drank even more coffee, which made him even more irritable, and he lashed out at Tucker and Caboose even more.

All of these things were small, and almost stupid to notice, really. But the thing about small changes is that they are only the beginnings of bigger and worse cracks in the foundation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yikes, has it been a month already? Oh sheesh, I'm sorry, I got so behind on this with finals and what not, and I never intended to be this late. However, good news! I promise, over my winter break, I will be a LOT more productive-I'm certain to have at least two more during the break, if not more! Thank you for reading, and thanks to my usuals for sticking around, if you have. I know this is a pain, but I promise, it won't be like this again.


	34. A goodbye

One morning, you woke up a little later than usual, and went outside to discover that Carolina was leaving. She didn’t want to wait any more, she was going to go find and possibly kill the director.

The freelancers all got up with her, but not all to go with. Mostly, they got up early to wish them well. South got up only for the thrill of telling Carolina how stupid her idea was, and for the last cup of coffee CT was going to make her for a while. Wash only got up to join North in cracking jokes about how badly this idea was going to go. They were almost all directed at York and his shortcomings. York laughed about most of them, except the ones about his sight. Wyoming laughed at those.  
Then the moment to leave came.

Thing about goodbyes-nobody likes them. They are awkward, and rushed, and nobody likes the negative connotations surrounding the idea of saying goodbye. What if you never see them again? What if they never come back? What if they come back someone new? What if…so many what ifs around the word goodbye. So many uncertainties.

The freelancers don’t say goodbye. They wait until the end of the conversation, and those who are going turn and go. They load up, this time in the jeep because there are so few of them, and they depart. It’s easy, and it’s quick, with no emotion. Right?

Well. If only they could pull it off right.

You miss the conversation that leads up to it, because you woke up a bit later than you usually do, and the freelancers always get up at insane hours of the morning. Or you miss the conversation that leads up to it because it happened in private, you don’t know. All you know is that there is one goodbye.

“Sure you don’t want to tag along?” York offered one last time, eyes darting between Wash and North. Wash shook his head flat out, North taking a moment to frown slightly. York looked at him with hopeful eyes-well, hopeful eye. 

“You know I can’t. Someone’s got to keep South out of trouble, right?” North laughed awkwardly. South pretended not to hear him, drinking her coffee as she sat next to you. You camped out in the shade from the bright morning sun, dressed but out of armor.

“I…yeah, yeah, right.” York nodded, hovering for a second longer before actually starting to go.

“Hey,” North threw out his arm, catching York by the bicep, “be careful out there.”

“When have I ever been?” York joked.

“York-”

“I’m only kidding. We’ll be fine, don’t worry.” He said it with such confidence, but there wasn’t one among you who believed in him. Especially not North, who kept holding on to his arm as if he didn’t know how to let go.

“North, cmon, let-” York started, but didn’t get to finish before he was yanked forward against North, who grabbed him by the cheeks and kissed him with everything he had. From where you sat, you didn’t get to really see much, North’s hands were in the way, but you could see it in his forced-shut eyes and the furrow of his brow. York tensed up, due to battle reflexes, and then relaxed.

South audibly groaned. Carolina turned away from whatever she was doing and looked up, smiling while shaking her head. None of the freelancers really seemed surprised by this turn of events.

Eventually, North let go. The conversation got way too quiet to hear across the base. York gave him a smile and a wink, finally moving to climb into the car. North’s hands wavered, but eventually just fell to his sides in defeat, and he waved goodbye with the rest of them.

So all in all, a very normal morning.

-

Seven hours later, Carolina finally calls on the radio. Says they made it. Says she has Wyoming and Florida surveying the entire area. Says she doesn’t like that she isn’t getting reports of any activity at all. Has to clarify that she means nothing is happening, not that Wyoming and Florida aren’t reporting in. After that, she hangs up.

Another four hours go by. Carolina calls again. Still nothing. Her voice sounds different, as if she’s very concerned that nothing is happening.

Six more hours. She only calls to inform the freelancers that her squad is going to sleep. The next morning, they’ll invade the compound. Figure out what all the silence is about.

That’s all you hear from them. There’s nothing else.


	35. Radio silence

Naturally, the remaining freelancers lose their shit when a full day and night go by without any word from them at all.

North immediately jumps to the conclusion that all of them are dead. It’s almost depressing how fast he brings up the possibility. South argues that it’s not likely, it’s only been twenty-four hours, and even so, she doesn’t think Carolina would fail her mission so quickly. Maine suggests they come up with a plan. Wash sets up a table in a room on the blue half of the base, and draws out the compound in permanent marker. Then he apologizes to Smith, who starts protesting because he just cleaned crayon off that table not five minutes before. The freelancers sit and go over possible strategies for invading the compound. From the amount of energy-bar rations they haul out, you know this is going to take a while.

But none of that matters. At least, not to you guys. You’ve got a bigger problem.

Church.

Let it be known that Church was originally on the same side as the rest of you-not up for taking the risk, even if it was the right thing to do, because he was as much of a dick as the rest of you. Kimball was ashamed of all of you, and you got some dirty looks from the kids, but you all felt justified at the end of the day for not going that extra mile.

And then Church, the guy who whines about walking two feet on his own, suddenly gained a sense of morality. Started shaming the blue team about the fact they weren’t fucking doing anything. Tucker called him out on his bullshit, the two started yelling, some things were said that REALLY shouldn’t have been, and now Church is acting like he is doing the ultimate in right things by helping the freelancers with their little rescue mission.

What a douche.

Honestly, you wouldn’t even be really that upset about it if it weren’t for the way the blues have just…collapsed. Caboose is depressed in a way that not even South’s dog, Freckles, can perk him back up. Tucker is sticking strictly to one-word responses, with the exception of Junior. And maybe Palomo, but Palomo has only gotten anger and yelling directed at him, so it’s not really something to be proud of.

The freelancers can’t even deal with the blue team right now. The freelancers can’t decide what to do. The freelancers legitimately consider fucking off, going back to whatever it is they were doing before all this went down. Wash doesn’t stand for it. They make fun of him for wanting to stay here, with Tucker and Junior, but none of the teases are meant to be harsh. Tucker tells all this to Grif, in a few short sentences, and then passes out on the red team’s couch.

Once again, none of that really matters to you. It’s not like you even know what’s going on anymore, why should you feel it’s necessary to think on it? Freelancers don’t tell the red team shit anyway, it’s not like there’s anything more to say about it.

But then there’s South.

She’s completely fine, apart from the ever-darker eyes she sports. She’s apparently dealt with much longer absences from her gal-pal, CT. She’s dealt with a lot of people just walking out on her, actually.

“Everyone leaves.” She says. “Everyone in my life leaves, except North.” She tells you over a moment’s respite. For a moment, there’s a look of vulnerability to her. She looks almost scared, or sad, as she thinks on all the people who cemented this fact in her brain. She will never tell you the names, you know that much, but you know she hasn’t forgotten anyone she’s lost.  
Yet she’s completely okay, she’s accepted that fact. It’s the goddamn apocalypse, after all. Forget the posh life you’ve been living, Simmons, people die every day out there in the real world. Then again, people died every day before this mess. You remember what it was like, risking life and limb just to find a place to sleep for the night.

Now, at least your nights are warm. You’re secure, you don’t need to wander around. You don’t need to find food. You don’t need to spend your nights thinking of all the people who have died around you. Because now, the only person that ever seems to get hurt is you. You ponder this as the freelancers keep trying to make a foolproof plan, keep failing. You ponder this until your brain gets tired and forces you unconscious.

“Oi, dickbiscuits, get up.” South rudely says the next morning, slamming open the door to the room you share with Grif now. It was the worst choice you ever made in your life, and you want nothing more than to leave this room (or better yet, destroy it with fire) but there’s a sort of secret charm to it, and-

“Hey! I know you two are awake, get your asses up!” she says louder, dragging you out of cloudy morning thoughts and snapping you back into reality. Grif grumbles, but it’s not meant to sound like words. You sit upright immediately, rubbing at your eyes with your human hand. You don’t like doing much with the robot hand, because it’s just a bit unstable and could probably take out your eye. Your left eye is the only thing left on your left side, you kinda want to keep that.

“What’s happening? Did you figure out a plan?”

“Yes and no. Get up, I want everyone in one area so I only have to explain this fucking piece of shit plan once, alright?”  
In South’s defense, the plan is very stupid. The plan literally consists of “we’re going to fucking go rescue the others and then blow their base up because we can”.

“There’s no way you’re gonna pull this off.” Tucker said at the end of it.

“We have to try. The Director can’t be allowed to do more of what he’s done.” Wash said with a sigh. Tucker glared at him. Wash looked back with tired eyes.

“It’s gonna be dangerous.”

“The world is dangerous. Didn’t stop us before, won’t stop us now.”

“If Carolina and Tex, your best bitches, can’t do this, what makes you think you can?”

“Well, someone has to haul them back here so they can beat your ass for calling them that.” South muttered, but the corner of her mouth was smiling.

It was the last smile you’d see for a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, has it been a month already? Wow does time fly! Not to worry, next chapter should be early next week, and it'll be muuuch longer for reasons you may not be excited to know.


	36. Night Watch

“So…this is the quietest we’ve been in a while, huh?”

“Shut up, Donut.” You grunt.

“I’m just saying, it’s weird to have so few people now. Don’t you think so, Grif?”

“No. I can finally hear myself think, I’m glad for it.”

“Like you have anything worth thinking about.” You add. Grif looks at you with an unamused face. Donut forces a laugh, pulling his legs close to his body to sit in that weird yoga sitting pose.

“Still, you’ve got to miss it a little.”

“You really don’t do quiet well, do you?” You joke.

“What makes you say that?”

“It hasn’t even been two days. Plus, we still have all the kids here, it’s not like we are back to the amount of people we started with.”

“We still have you, Simmons, we aren’t close to getting the amount of silence we’re used to.” Grif cuts you off, laying down on the flat part of the wall. The three of you are enjoying dusk, since there’s fucking nothing else to do. The freelancers are gone, no need to dwell on it. Kimball and Doyle and the kids are still here, but they don’t seem to want to wander out far tonight. Tucker is having some quality time with his son, which the three of you were watching until he caught you and told you off about it. Normally, you’d all fight, but Tucker still looks so empty, and if he thinks keeping Junior entertained will help, you all know better than to step in and ruin it.

“I can also go fuck off, if that’s what you want.” You offer, sarcastically.

“Please do.”

“Grif, no.” Donut adds softly.

“Alright. I’ll go, but I’m taking a whole lot of shit with me.”

“Fuck that, the food is ours, leave it alone!”

“I wasn’t just going to take food, fatass!”

“Good. You can take whatever else you want, then. We expect you out of here by morning.” Grif jokes. You roll your eyes.

“Asshole.”

“Bitch.”

“Guys, cmon, don’t do this in front of me!” Donut whines.

“What’s the deal with you? Normally you’re all over us being…us.” Grif snaps, but there’s an undercurrent in his voice. He’s almost concerned. Almost. Like 3%, maximum.

“Are you offering me something here?”

“No!”

“Darn.” Donut says with a smile. It’s a little too big to be genuine.

“You’d enjoy it too much.” You add in.

“What, like you two aren’t just as gay as I am!” Donut protests.

“I’m straight.” You answer. You’re proud that you can hold a straight face for it.

“Me too.” Grif says.

“You guys must think I’m dumber than a sack of rocks!” He laughs.

“I mean, according to York, it’s not gay if you-” You start, but both Grif and Donut have heard this remark one too many times, and both of them groan loudly.

“God damn, I think I know why Wyoming popped a round through his skull.” Grif mutters to himself. He actually bothers to sit up for once.

“You mean it isn’t because York is a jackass?”

“Shut up, of course it is! York’s a special kind of a son of a bitch.”

“The real question is why anyone liked it. York’s banged, like, three freelancers minimum.” Donut adds in. He doesn’t sound that confused.

“Goddamn it, Donut, why’d you make it gay?” Grif says through his hands, sinking back to the ground. You shift your weight around a little.

“Oh come on!”

“I’m serious, dude, why’s it always gay with you?”

“It is not always gay with me!” Donut says, not in an angry way but with an angry voice. You and Grif both give him the same look. Donut wrinkles his nose at you two, crossing his arms.

“You guys are the worst.” Donut whines, but he isn’t going to do anything about it. You and Grif look at each other and shrug, because yeah, you two are pretty awful.

“If it makes you feel better,” you say nonchalantly, “at least with us your life isn’t in danger. You could be out with York, getting shot at.”

“Fuck, if that’s all you want, just hand me a gun. I’ll take a few shots!” Grif adds in.

“Yeah, well, not all of us are meant to be big heroes.”

“Some of us are meant to be damsels, right?” Grif, now you’re just being a dick.

“Ladies!” Comes the condescending call of a gruff old man you recognize. It’s Sarge, obviously. Lopez is with him. “What are you still doing up there? Get down off that wall!”

“Right away, sir!” You call down before Grif can be sarcastic. Sarge huffs, and walks off to some other destination. Lopez says something in Spanish, then walks off in the same direction.

“We aren’t actually getting off the wall, are we?” Donut asks.

“Fuck no.” Grif grumbles.

“Sarge just hates all the stillness. He’ll get readjusted in time, no worries.” You explain.

“He better hurry the fuck up. This is the third time in an hour that he’s told us to move, and to do what? Nothing. The base didn’t magically get fucked up, and we have more rations than we know what to do with, so he can go fuck himself.” Grif complains. He likes doing that, complaining. There’s a moment you wonder which response is better, agreeing and complaining or insulting him. It’s always fun to insult Grif. Tonight, however, is not the night for it. You choose to stare out at the horizon.  
With just Grif, this would be a comfortable silence. The two of you would exist together for a little bit until one of you couldn’t help but make a crack at the other. With Donut here, it’s somewhat awkward. Donut has never liked long pauses with nothing happening, and when he cuts off the silence, it’s usually for some gay reason. Tonight, it takes a little bit longer before silence starts bothering him. You can’t blame him. The blues have infected everyone else with their depression. A thick cloud of shared misery and anger hangs over this base, even the red side.

“Hey, guys?” he asks quietly after another moment.

“Yeah?” you answer. Grif doesn’t move.

“You think they’re ever coming back?”

“Didn’t I tell you numbnuts to get off the wall ten minutes ago? Quit lollygagging around, there’s work to be done around here!” Sarge keeps anyone from answering Donut’s question.

“But sir, what are we supposed to be doing?” You call down.

“You’re supposed to be on watch! With the freelancers all skeedaddled and the blues finally feeling as disgusting as they should, we are severely underhanded! We could be attacked at any moment!” Sarge explains in his usual way-bombastic yelling and paranoia.

“But sir, who’s going to attack us?”

“Ten bucks he says the blues.” Grif mumbles. You smack his hand, the way you two do to sign on for bets.

“We won’t know until you three go do your jobs, now will we? Get to it!” Sarge leaves. Lopez is nowhere to be seen. You hold your hand out to Grif expectantly, and he scoffs.

“We don’t have money, it’s the apocalypse.”

“You can owe me other things.”

“Gross.” Donut adds as he stands up.

“Get your mind out of the gutter!” You snap at him, smacking Grif to get him to stand up. Grif does not, not even when you stand up and grab his shoulders and pull with all your strength. Grif is impossible to move without a crane. Donut offers to help, and with the two of you combined, you still can’t make Grif get up. You can, however, drag his limp form with you to the nearest guard outpost and dump him unceremoniously on the ground there.

As expected, nothing happens on watch. Unfortunately, Sarge’s strategy lacks people, so the three of you (además Lopez) are stuck watching. All night. Grif, naturally, is the first one to fall asleep. Donut is next, falling asleep in a very awkward position. Lopez doesn’t seem to need sleep, but he does get annoyed when he tries to start a conversation with you and forgets momentarily that non-freelancers don’t speak Spanish. He checks out, walking off to his quarters to actually get a good night’s sleep.

So that leaves you and a whole fucking lot of nothing. Great.

At first, you’re good at entertaining yourself. All you have to do is be aware of motion, this job isn’t hard. But with long stretches of nothing, and the incessant beeping of your mechanical bits whining about not having much of a charge left, you call it quits. 

As you walk to your quarters, you pass Sarge, who is sleeping while standing. With his eyes open. You almost don’t need sleep after that.

 

You wake up, and Grif has also abandoned his post, opting instead to plop down on top of you. You have never been more grateful for having metal organs, because you would have suffocated normally. Of course, metal bits or no, you can’t get up.  
Trying to get him to move is like trying to lift Sheila-it doesn’t happen. It’s not just the weight thing, even. But all the same, he provides a good excuse for more sleep. You manage to get your robot hand out from under him and start absentmindedly running fingers through his hair. It’s a sweet gesture, until they get caught on his tangles (can’t even be bothered to brush his own fucking hair, what a dick) and then caught in the mechanical parts and you wake him up by yanking at a fistful of hair that is now stuck in your hand. He flails, still obviously tired, and smacks you with an elbow right in your left eye, which you know is going to leave a bruise. So much for smooth, Simmons.

So at the break of day, the two of you have to sneak your way over to the medical bay and get Doc to shave Grif’s hair. Grif is not happy about this. You are not happy about how you’re going to have to give the arm back to Lopez and just not have one for a while. Fuck.

After giving up the arm to Lopez, you run into Jensen, and she asks about your arm. You ask how she’s doing with hers, and she tries to blow it off like she’s totally fine with it, but you can tell it still bothers her a little. After a little prying, you discover that she was bitten by her own friend, Cunningham. The two had been zombies for a lot longer than you had assumed, and Jensen would sometimes go down to where they were kept, just to talk to them. She’d gotten too close, and he’d taken the chance to bite her, and it would have been worse if Volleyball hadn’t wandered down and yanked her away. It’s why she was so embarrassed about the whole thing, because to her, the missing arm was a reminder of her own stupidity. You reassure her that everyone makes stupid mistakes, and that they are things to learn from. You tell her about the tool shed, the thing that started your whole little adventure, and that if you hadn’t made that one mistake you wouldn’t be here now, talking to her. You even call her smart, and her face just lights up. For the first time in ten years, you are given a hug by a girl. It is awkward, and you have no idea what you’re supposed to be doing with your remaining arm.

But you’re just glad to see her happy, for once.


	37. Sarge

“Listen up, dirtbags.” Says Sarge above the yelling and the screaming, as he takes a step up onto a nearby box. It’s enough, somehow, to get everyone to shut up.

Weirdly enough, two hours ago it would have been a miracle to have anyone be saying anything.

Wash called in. He didn’t get to explain what was going on before a nearby explosion cut him off, but it was obvious that everything has gone to shit quickly. Wash himself sounded panicked, and was trying to explain what exactly they had found, but only got out that they were outnumbered, and something about the possibility of Felix and Locus being involved. He sounded almost scared, and the fact that ten seconds of Wash crouching and murmuring that shit was fucked conveyed a sense of fear terrifies you.

“I know we are up against what you may call impossible odds, and you’re right. We are not the freelancers. We don’t have any fancy-schmancy gizmos, gadgets, or training. In fact, we have almost nothing new to bring to the fight other than bullets and our bodies.”

You all tried everything you could think of to get Wash back. Or someone else. Even Church was preferable than the empty, cold silence.

Tucker came to the decision to go bail them out without even asking the group. Kimball, who took it upon herself to represent said group, pointed out how stupid that idea was. She didn’t call it stupid, she used a lot of military terms that you had never heard before, so you’ll paraphrase with the word stupid.

The two started fighting, in a civil way. It soon became a civil war, as things tend to do with this ragtag team of idiots.

“So I won’t blame you if you don’t want to risk your life for a fight that isn’t ours. Fact, if you want to, I’d think you were crazy.” Sarge pauses, let’s out a low chuckle. “So I’m not gonna tell ya to. Hell, I won’t even ask. But I will remind you, we are the reds and blues.”

The light in the room seems to shift entirely to Sarge, as if he is in a spotlight and also standing in front of the sun. Behind him, two American flags slide into view, supported at a slant by poles that you swear were not there a little bit ago. A voice that sounds like Sarge’s but can’t actually be Sarge’s since he is currently speaking starts singing some sort of anthem, which is basically just the phrase “Glory to the red team” repeated over and over to the tune of something patriotic.

“The world fell apart around us, and instead of getting wiped out, we survived. Not only that, but we’re thriving. We’ve looked death in the eye multiple times, and death blinked first.”

“You guys see the flags, right?” Palomo asks to the group of onlookers.

“Fuck the flags, who is singing?” Grif asks right back.

“So I’m not asking you to risk your lives. I’m not asking nothing of you.” Sarge goes on, undeterred by the group confusion. “Except one thing.”

“…What’s that?” Doyle asks, when Sarge pauses in the most dramatic way possible. Wait, when did he prop one foot up like Captain Morgan?

“Do you ever wonder why we’re here?” Sarge asks, and you can hear a little gasp coming from Grif, who adjusts his position before clearing his throat.

“It’s one of life’s greatest mysteries, isn’t it?” He starts, nonchalantly.

“No, Grif, not that crap again. I mean here. Why are we here, in this base. As far as I can tell, we’re a group of cast-outs and losers.”

“Hey-” Doc starts, not as offended as you’ve heard him be. Like the time Grif got him to dick around with what they thought were unloaded pistols, and Doc accidentally shot Caboose in the foot. Rest in pieces, pinky toe. Doc was almost angry at someone that day, because Grif told him later he knew the pistols were loaded and just wanted to see what would happen.

“But the red guy upstairs has decided to let us keep on going. Or maybe it’s dumb luck. That doesn’t matter.” Sarge says with a pointed glance toward Grif. Guess you aren’t the only one he’s tried to have the existential crisis talk with.

“Why do I even try.” Doc mutters to himself, and Donut puts a hand on his slumped shoulders.

“What matters is that they are in trouble. Our own are in trouble, and we haven’t done anything to help them. For good reason, maybe, but who are we to stand around and yak about responsibility and smarts?” Sarge has changed poses. When does he do that? When you blink? How did he move so fast?

“Wait, what are you-” Tucker starts, but can’t get any farther.

“We’ve never been smart. Why start now? Ask yourself, are you the type to play it safe…”  
He cocks his rifle. There is no record of the flags ever existing, there is no music, but you swear he still looks just as epic in this moment as when you first met him.

“…or do you want to get a little reckless?” he finally ends his weird and rambling speech, stepping down off the box. Nobody says anything.

Everyone is stuck in a weird sense of awe, just for a few moments. None of you know what just happened, but it was cool and also completely impossible.

“Okay, before we go on, we have to talk about that flag thing. What was that all about?” Dr. Grey interrupts, pushing herself forward to question Sarge about that show. He only has a shrug for an answer. She’s not happy about that.

“He’s right.” Someone says. It doesn’t matter who.

Tucker looks at the floor for a bit. Caboose is also looking at the floor, but probably for a different reason. The rest of you also let the words sink in while looking at the floor. It helps solidify the point.

Tucker looks up. He straightens his back.

He walks away.

Sarge nods slightly, waiting a second before marching off after him.

Caboose follows, with Smith close behind until Kimball grabs him by the shoulder. You’re so distracted by the gesture you miss Grif walking off to join Tucker, and have to speed-walk to catch up with him.  
Kaikaina grabs Doc by the arm and drags him along, walking fast enough to catch up to you and Grif with the pacifist in tow. You hear Donut behind you, knowing him from the way he walks.

“Where are they going?” Bitters asks. You don’t hear the response from the group you’re leaving behind. You don’t know if anyone even tried to answer him.

 

“That’s the plan. Any questions?” Tucker asks, in a voice so serious it’s almost alien.

“Yeah, do we have a better plan?” Grif whines.

“Any other questions?”

“We’re all gonna die.” Donut bemoans.

“That’s a statement, not a question.” Doc corrects him. Donut glares at him.

“No questions then? Good.”

“Okay, Lavernius Fucker, take a step back. That wasn’t a plan; that was a general statement. A “try harder to win” kind of statement. This is bullshit, and it will get us all killed. Do we seriously have no better options?” Grif snarls at Tucker, who keeps angling himself away from having Grif in his line of sight. Tucker only shrugs.

“The freelancers sat at this table and made complex strategies, and they failed. We’ll just do what we do best, okay?”

“Winging it is not something you can be best at.”

“Fuck off, dude, it’s not like you’ve come up with anything better.”  
Grif lets out a huff, but Tucker’s right.

“Alright then. Let’s get moving.” Grif resigns himself, pushing past you and Doc to get out of the small crowd around this sharpied table.

You find him later, pocketing a pack of cigarettes where he’s supposed to be putting extra ammo, damnit. He does the same thing with an old snack cake.


	38. The facility

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Wow, it's been a while-sorry I haven't been updating, I got really busy with the end of school, and my grandpa just passed away and I spent a week helping with funeral preparations. Point is, that's all in the past, and I am back! We are finally beginning the last arc, people!

There’s really no point in talking about the ride here, so you won’t. Mainly because here isn’t anywhere. This isn’t a destination. This is a gas station.  
“There’s no way in hell we are going to find anything here. Statistically speaking, gas stations are probably one of the most-” you start explaining when Grif originally pulls over, but he ignores you entirely and gets out of the car. “You know what? I hope they do have slurpees just so we can all watch you get sick off old food!” You yell after him.

“Slurpees aren’t a food!” He yells back, and ducks inside. He’s been more snide with you all morning, and the entire car ride has consisted of you and the red team debating on who the best pre-apocalyptic pop singer was (you and Donut both agree it was Beyonce, Sarge insists it’s those “robot fellers”, and it took you thirty-eight minutes to finally figure out he was talking about Daft Punk) and thinking of horribly shitty superpowers.

“How about the power to shoot slurpees out of your hands? Like, full cups and all.” Donut pipes up, leaning over your seat. The blues, seated in the jeep, keep honking at you. You honk back.

“That’s much worse than flying North.” Sarge agrees.

“But you can only fly North! As soon as you land you have to walk to wherever you were going!” You insist yet again, sliding into the driver’s seat of Felix’s stolen car (you have gotten a bit too much practice getting over these chairs, you think) and moving so your foot is just laying a consistent, long beep at the blues. Tucker flips you off.

“But you can still fly!” Donut counters for the fourteenth time.

“In one direction!” You counter for the fifteenth time.

“HURRY THE FUCK UP GRIF!” Tucker screams out the side of the blue car. Doyle, sitting in the driver’s seat of their jeep, has never looked so unhappy in his life.

You all keep going. You end the superpower discussion with the power to turn into the Hulk…but only when you’re sleeping. This causes so much debate between you reds that Lopez finally stops trying to sleep in the spot next to the window and snaps at you all in Spanish. Donut, stuck in-between Sarge and Lopez, tries to lean toward Sarge until your C.O. physically pushes him out of his personal bubble.

You all keep going. Where you’re going, it’s a lot easier to use the backways around, which mean that the two cars can drive side by side and Grif and Tucker can keep talking about…whatever it is these two talk about. You don’t really want to know, with those two. You sometimes interject when you hear something you have an opinion on or a fact you need to correct (need to correct, Grif, not feel like sticking your dick in). Donut starts asking you intense math problems, which you answer completely incorrectly but with enough confidence that they all believe that you are right. Sarge even says that’s “damn impressive”.

You all keep going. At one point, you all stop at the beach to let Caboose take a bathroom break. He gets back in the car and you immediately drive into the ocean. None of you question this. When you get out of the ocean, Caboose needs to pee again, saying that he drank “a lot of water on the way here”.

You all keep going. You pass the heated desert, the swampy middle-land, and finally reach the icy tundra. You meet a guy named Andy who insults every single one of you before you run him over with the jeep. He lives through it, unfortunately.

You all keep going. Kimball and Doyle argue over the fact they both came with you, and the kids (and Junior) are all back the base. Doc and Grey, riding in the very back of the jeep, remind them calmly that the kids will be fine and have two AI watching over them anyway. In no way does Dr. Grey whine about hearing the same arguments for the past four months and jump off the Blue’s car, rolling around in the dust you all leave behind before Sarge makes Grif stop your car. Grey gets a spot in your back seat. Lopez lays on top of the roof, finally looking relaxed now that he isn’t in immediate vicinity of your team.

Somehow, somewhere, there is the end. Of your car ride, you mean, not the end of the world or anything. That’d be pretty bitching, actually. You’d be okay with meeting death if you got to see the edge of the world.

But yeah, you eventually get to your destination. It’s a fucking giant steel wall. There are a whole bunch of marks all over it, everything from claw marks to burns and bullets. It’s built into a cliff face, and the thing is protected by an AI that seems way too familiar.

“Filss?” You ask it, and she responds very kindly.

“Hello and welcome! Unfortunately, visitors are not allowed on the premises. Please leave, or we will be forced to take aggressive action. You have thirty seconds to comply.”

“Computer lady! Do you remember us? We’re the blues! And the reds!” Caboose throws in.

“It is very nice to meet you! You have twenty seconds to comply.”

None of you do anything remotely close to complying. Filss continues her countdown, but before she reaches one, Sarge lifts his shotgun and blasts the panel she’s in. Nothing aggressive happens after that, so you assume it somehow worked. It did not, however, open the door.

“Nice job destroying our one way in.” Grif sneers at him, and Sarge loads up his shotgun to take another blast. Grif moves uncharacteristically fast to avoid sudden death.

“So…now what?” Doc asks, and all of you subconsciously look to Tucker. He shrugs.

“Fuck if I know, Wash didn’t say shit about a giant steel wall!”

“Well, we did our best. Time to go home. We’ll always remember them fondly.” Grif says with a yawn, turning around to walk away.

“We could have one of us sneak in through another entrance and open this one from the inside.” Donut throws in, eager as ever to turn his life into some form of movie.

“Or we could, you know, use the rocket launcher Sarge made us carry all the way here.” You point out. That thing is a beaut. You’ve only ever seen it once before, and you’ve never seen it fired. Church always insisted that it worked perfectly, and by worked perfectly he meant that Caboose had once gotten his hands on it and everything was on fire for a good hour.

You can see why this thing is kept under lock and key. It’s very powerful. And by very powerful, you mean that you are finally in the facility, and that wall will never be repaired. Also, what little grass was growing around here is now all on fire.

“So much for sneaking in.” Donut whines, but says nothing else of it as you all walk inside.

“You know, I thought we’d all be sniped right from the get go, but this base is…quiet.” Tucker comments aloud as your group creeps onward. You get through hallway after hallway, and there’s nothing. Long expanses of quiet, empty halls. No people, no enemies, just…nothing.

“Would you say it’s quiet…too quiet?” Grif asks in the expanse of silence.

“No, because that would be fucking stupid!”

“Cmon Tuck, say it.”

“No!” Tucker snaps back at him, peeking around the corner of another dead silent hallway.

“Hey, guys? You starting to think that maybe this is some sort of elaborate trap?”

“Donut, you watch too many spy movies. Maybe there just really isn’t anyone-” You start, hitting the button on a door panel that looks like it leads to somewhere.

“-here?” you finish as you realize what’s actually happened here. Dear god, you wish you hadn’t opened this door.


	39. Bloody hell

Next to you on the floor, you can barely make out the blurry pink shape of Donut. There’s blood clouding your vision, and your helmet is cracked, the shards pointing at your face, keeping you from pulling it off and wiping the blood away.  
You somehow always knew this would happen. Your left eye was the last left thing you had left. It was only a matter of time before you lost it, really.

Donut’s knocked cold. He got it worse than you, you think. A grenade, right to the face. You’re not even completely sure he’s still living. He’s not moving, and he’s sprawled awkwardly over the ground. You are also awkwardly sprawled on the ground. All around you, every which way, there are people sprawled awkwardly on the ground. You can’t make out anyone else, you can barely even see Donut, and he’s a foot away from you. Or two feet? You can’t tell anymore.

Ever hear of Phineas Gage? He got a railroad spike right through the head. It didn’t even hurt him, but boy did it fuck with his personality. This is a little bit like that, you think. Only instead of a spike, a sniper round. Bam, right through the eye. You’d give the sniper points for accuracy, considering the target was hard to see, being a shot made through a helmet, but honestly fuck that guy.

Donut coughs next to you. Looks like he’s still alive and kicking. Literally. He kicks what you assume are his legs out, trying to ground himself, trying to push himself up onto something, trying to get back up and into it. Bless his little gay heart. You reach out with your remaining human hand, trying to reach him with your fucked-up vision and bloody depth perception. You end up resting your hand on his bicep. He squirms instantly, jerking back and forth, but when your fingertips do nothing more than lay on his arm, he slowly relaxes. His panicked actions calm down a little, soothed by the fact he knows someone else is there and not trying to kill him.

You hear a distant yell over the blurred-out gunshots. Nothing sounds like sound any more, it all sounds like white noise and liquid in your ears. That’s blood, of course.

You’re reminded of the first time you went swimming after the apocalypse. You had always hated swimming, it involved too much exposure and humiliation for your tastes. However, with the world having ended, swimming was a relaxing break from spending all day covered in dirt. The water was fucking freezing, filled with gross algae, and on top of all of it you got a disgusting lake plant hooked around your ankle, but you were at least…clean. Of course, your clothes were still covered in dirt, and you didn’t have any towels which led to you sitting on the bank until you got dry, covering your legs with dirt again and defeating the entire purpose of the swim. This, somehow, reminds you of now.

“Who’s there?” Donut croaks, his voice straining and extra loud. He probably can’t even hear himself, much less you.

“Me.” You gargle out, mouth full of blood and ears full of blood and eyes full of blood and dear god what if you drown in your own blood? That would be a horrible way to go.

“Hello?” Nope, Donut can’t hear you. You try to squeeze his arm a little harder, thinking on a way to convey it’s you without him panicking.

“It’s me!” You try to yell, but you start coughing, splattering the blood in your mouth all around you again, and now you just can’t see anything that isn’t red. Your grip on Donut falters as you lift your arm back up to yourself, reflexively grabbing at your helmet. Don’t do that, don’t do that, the helmet is broken and will cut your face all to hell if you try to pull it off, don’t—  
It stings like a son of a bitch and you feel glass rip through half your face, but the damn thing comes off. Christ, so much blood. It’s oozing into your armor, puddling on the floor. You heard that head injuries bleed more than other ones, but this is just…obscene. There’s no way this is all your blood. This is, like, all the blood in your body. Fuck, shit, are you getting woozy?

“Sarge?” Donut asks, body leaning toward you. Sorta. He kinda slumps sideways, his visor thumping the ground in your general direction. At least his eyes still work—his helmet is charred to shit, a burned black spot over the side of his helmet. You can’t see if he’s bleeding or not. You’re kind stressing about yourself right now, with your stupid brain having just ripped your face open. Good job, brain, way to make stupid decisions in an effort to see clearly.

You want to move. You want to just move, but you keep losing feeling in your limbs. Oh god, you’re bleeding out. You’re going to bleed out on the floor and the only person who is near you is Donut. Donut, who can’t even hear you. You can’t move your leg. You can’t lift your arm.

You are going to die here, a puddle of blood on the floor, and the last words anyone will have heard you say are “Oh holy fuckballs”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Goddamn, I'm so used to reading 39 and 40 right on top of each other, I forgot how short they actually are! Though 41 will be anything but short, I promise you.


	40. oh holy fuckballs

All hell broke loose when you opened the door. Turns out half the base had turned into zombies, but not normal zombies. Those…those were not normal anything. There is no proper way to explain what they were, but the words “demonic” and “holy fuck an actual nightmare” come to mind.  
You managed to get away from them, but in so doing you walked right into the other problem on the base—the other freelancer agents. The freelancers you knew had already been subdued and locked up, and by walking straight into an obvious trap you all managed to get caught, too.

Everyone except Donald Doyle.

Now, you weren’t exactly…awake for most of this. You were, after all, shot in the fucking head. And everything before that is better explained by someone who is not you.

Here’s what you yourself know, Simmons:  
You broke into the base like a group of jackasses, but the base was busy with other problems; zombie problems. It’s almost as if a world filled with zombies is dangerous and many people have to risk their lives on the daily just to live to see another day or something. Of course, you were all under the assumption that the freelancers would be able to control creatures as slow and dim-witted as zombies.

You were evidently wrong.

The freelancers were completely overrun with a horde of freakishly quick and terrifying zombies, nothing like any undead you had ever seen. You don’t even know if you could use other words to describe them, because terrifying is the only one that repeats in your mind over and over.

When you got to the base, the people still alive were locked away on the other half of the base, sealed up with the food and water supply in a hope they could survive. When you arrived, you all foolishly walked into the main hangar, and were suddenly challenged by some kind of super-zombie that not only were freakishly fast and nightmare inducing, but they were…well, smart is stretching it, but they were smart enough to know that you weren’t zombies, and they were smart enough to figure out where the weaker spots in the armor were, and good god if you didn’t have Kevlar between you and them you would all be so fucking dead, just fucking stains on that hangar floor.

“Oh holy fuckballs!” You screamed. In a very high pitched voice, too.

You swear you heard Tucker yelling about how “if anyone survives, tell my son I love him!” and Sarge screaming something incoherent about his unrequited love for Lopez (or possibly Dr. Grey? Again, incoherent), but then…  
Well, okay, you gotta admit, it was cool. For a few minutes, you were all screaming, and then something just fucking snapped in Caboose, and he just fucking started mauling these hell beasts left and right, until Kimball finally realize that hey, maybe Caboose could be clearing a path for you guys, and instead of fucking sitting around and screaming, you should all be getting up and running away? Nobody has to actually die? So you do as she says, and you fucking hightail it out of there. Of course, Caboose follows, which means any of the zombies left also follow, and everything is just horrible already.

And then you get to the quarantined section where the remaining freelancers are sitting around in fear. With guns.

Great.

They start with a sticky grenade that lands on Donut’s face, and while he screams about how he doesn’t want to die, the rest of you dive for cover in the hallway behind you, guns pointed out to kill any zombies while you wait for the thing to pop off. Donut’s down.

They open fire, but their terrain is their own downfall, as there is a whole row of boxes right next to the doors that you can easily hide behind, and you know these were barricades against the horde but fuck if this isn’t some convenient bullshit. You all hunker in the bunker, Caboose gives Donut’s body an affectionate little pat. Doyle closes the door behind you, and instead of asking if you guys maybe aren’t here to fucking kill them, like normal people would, the freelancers get their fucking sniper to start picking you off. You’re down next.

There’s a lot that happens after that that you can’t explain well. In fact, you can’t explain at all. None of it is yours to tell, so you’ll let someone else do the telling, for once.

Your name is now Carolina.


	41. Half Jaguar

Your name is Carolina.

Your name is Carolina, and you have issues with your father. Understatement of the fucking century, you know, but this entire thing is his fault, and you will hold him accountable.  
You know, when you were younger, there was a common joke among the people that knew your parents. “We get why he loves Allison,” they’d say, “but what in god’s name does she see in him?”

When you were younger, you hated that joke, because to you your parents were both very in love. You hated that joke, because your mother was a loving woman, and to imply anything else was insulting. You hated that joke, because despite his shortcomings, your father was a good man.

Then you got older, and you realized the point of the joke. You can’t imagine anything in him that your mother would love. You can’t remember whatever it is you saw in him, either.

Your father is now the leader of a…cult like thing. At first, it was a survivor station, a place where people could learn to defend themselves so they could live and thrive. But he started slimming the ranks, and started treating it as an army, and turned people away, and eventually you turned your back on him.

He wanted to find a cure for what ailed the world. Instead, he created a worse world. Good job, dad.

But that’s not the problem you have with your father. Oh yes, it’s a big problem, and you hate him for it, but there’s just one last thing.

He has the audacity to say he’s doing all of this because it’s what your mother would’ve done.

You remember your mother as an enigma. Sometimes she would be there, sometimes she wouldn’t, and even if you caught her on the cusp of leaving, she would never acknowledge that she was going. She’d never say goodbye, ever, because she didn’t want to risk it being the last time she ever said it. She always started her mornings with a run and an apple, and when she wasn’t there your father would start his mornings with an apple, but never the run. Every year for your birthday, she took the same card and just put a post-it note over the number to manually change it. She taught you how to throw your first punch, taught you how to kick, taught you how to (theoretically, of course) kill a man. She never stayed home for mother’s day, never stayed home for father’s day, never stayed home.

You remember your mother with bags in her hands, always ready to leave at a moment’s notice. What you don’t remember her as is someone who would force other people to go, too.

Your name is Carolina, and you have issues with your father. More specifically, with the ideas he has about your mother.

For starters, the idea that forcibly turning people into zombies in a fucked-up attempt to find a cure for it would be anything that she would endorse.

“What. The. Fuck.” She would say, holding your dad by the collar and staring into his eyes with an expression of pure rage. “Why would you think this is okay?”  
But she’s not here.

Your aunt, Texas, has a few things right about you. You are, indeed, a bitch, and you are, indeed, going about this situation all wrong. You knew that the moment you walked in. This entire endeavor was risky and everyone was going to be in danger, but fuck it, something needed to be done, and you were tired of sitting by and being taunted by Tucker, who is…actually a pretty good father, despite being a terrible human being. 

So here you are. You bust into your own house after being away for so long, and you and your team are instantly overwhelmed by hordes of the undead. Filss, the station AI, at least recognizes you and leads you down a way that is safer. You shudder at the implication that she would do nothing if you had been a stranger.

She led you down a series of hallways and doors, a bunch of security measures to prevent the zombies from following after you and your teammates, and then finally into a bigger area that you instantly recognize as what used to be a mess hall.

Now it’s a mess.

You get a quick headcount of your crew before walking in to inspect the place. The tables haven’t been upended or anything, they are just…gone. Scuff marks cover the floor, along with a giant black stain in the middle of the room.

“Jesus, did someone die in here?” York asks, waving his hand in front of his face to exaggerate the terrible smell. Nobody responds to him, hanging back around the edges as you walk forward to investigate the room.

There’s really not that much to see, Carolina, judging as all the furniture has been taken elsewhere and the lights are still on. Just scuff marks and a giant dried puddle of what has to be blood. In fact, the scuff marks lead right up to the puddle. Almost like…

“Fuck.” You mutter, walking hallway around the puddle to confirm your suspicion. “This was another execution.” You don’t have to explain what you mean to them. They all remember finding out about your father’s murder room.

“He’s probably still alive then.” CT throws out into the quiet of the room.

“What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go get him.” Wyoming tuts.

It’s actually not that hard to find him, since the base is only 10% occupied by things that are not dead. Well, okay, you don’t find HIM, per se, but you find who is left of the freelancer force. Not very many people, really. They all looked scared and hungry, so you aren’t exactly surprised when all of them turn guns on you.

“Who the fuck are you?” One of them asks. “How’d you get in?” Another asks at the same time.

“Aw, you don’t remember us? Really? Darn, I thought we were special.” Florida says, and you can feel the roll in his eyes.

“Kinda wish South was here right now. We could use her yelling.” CT mutters.

“I’m Carolina, and these are-”

“Oh, shit, THE Carolina?” one person from the back of the room yells.

“Yes?” You say, unsure how else to answer. There’s a long moment of silence and murmurs from the other side; no guns are lowered.

“Hey, we aren’t here to wreck the place, we just want to see-” York starts, taking a few steps forward. One of the guys in front shoots the floor just ahead of him, a warning shot.

CT isn’t the only one who wishes you had South right now.

“Alright,” the mob of people agrees after long deliberation, most of it about how much you looked or didn't look like the director, “go ahead and go through.”

“Thank you.” You tell them.

“Don’t come back.” They tell you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WEEEEELLLL SHIT.  
> There's no excuse for how terrible I am, and I am so so sorry about the wait!!! I'm going to try and get two more chapters posted today, and then it'll be another short hiatus as I won't be in town for a long while!!!  
> I know I've kept you waiting, and I am sorry it's been so long, but let's FINISH THIS.


	42. Half Shark

You find your father…okay, no, stop. You find where your father most likely is, that office of his that’s tucked away from everything. There’s still a six-foot wall of pure steel between you and him. Paranoid fuck never did want anything to be able to barge in.

“Can’t you hurry it up a little?” You hiss at your one way in, which happens to be York. Expert at picking locks, even computerized ones.

“I haven’t done anything this complicated since back when I had, y’know, two eyes!” York snaps back, eyebrows furrowing even more.

“What’s even going to happen when we get in there?” Florida asks quietly.

“When I get in there.” You tell him.

“What?”

“This is family business, Butch. I’m going alone.”

“You dragged us all out here for-” He starts, and even slips into his ultimate dad tone.

“I dragged you all along because I didn’t know what would-“

“Oi! Cut that shit out, I’m trying to work here!” York hollers back at you. Florida crosses his arms with a huff, stepping away to check the hallway behind you.

 

It takes literal hours for York to finally do his damn job, but the door slides up with a hiss of air. It only slides about halfway up before the machinery starts making noises you are certain machines are not ever supposed to make.

“Be careful.” York says as you duck under the door.

“If you hear me yelling, and it’s not a string of expletives, come in after me.” You say back, and he gives you a finger pistol in return.

The room is…clean. Pristine. There’s not even a layer of dust over any of it.

He’s sitting in that damn chair. You know he’s there, because on the monitor on the wall plays some old home movies.

“Leonard, put that thing down!” the computerized voice of your mother says with a laugh. “You’re gonna make me late! I have to go!”

You step forward. He doesn’t even register your existence until you’re standing right next to him.

“Hello, Carolina.” He says, weakly. Doesn’t even look your way.

“Director.” You say back.

“Here to kill me?” he asks, with all the fight taken out of his voice.

“For what you’ve done-” you start. It comes out sounding like both a question and a reason. He mutters something indistinct, something you can’t catch.

“…more time. Just a little more time.”

“You’ve had your time. And all you’ve done with it is ruin the lives of innocent people. Your time is over, sir.” You say, raising your pistol, but the conviction is out of your voice.

It’s then that the base is rocked by an explosion. You don’t even have time to ask your team what that was, as the steel door slides back down with a loud thunk. For the first time in a long time, you have nothing to do but talk to your father.

 

You walk out later, door now unlocked from your side, down a pistol. From down the hallway, you can still hear the muffled bang.

 

You meet up with York and the others and try to figure out what happened while you were in there, only to find it was your own darn red and blue idiots trying to “save the day” or something. Freelancer team B is a complete no-show. Also, your little primary-colored saviors are lucky they brought a fucking medic, because…yikes.

They aren’t really freelancer material, after all.

Once Caboose gets stable enough, he starts going on about how long you and your team were out here, and how everyone else got worried, and how they all decided to come over and help you throw a father’s day party, and after that you just tune out and nod when he stops to breathe.

Half of these guys look like they’ve been thrown through a woodchipper. The other half are just wounded and motionless on the floor.

Good thing about your crew; they never really liked the new agents, so putting them down…wasn’t really a problem for them. You know.

There’s a slight discourse around what should be done with the base now that only zombies (and you, of course) are in it. The general consensus is to torch the place and walk away, no regrets. Cement, however, doesn’t burn as easily as you would like, so you decide to just blow it to hell. You’re lucky, Carolina, that there were weapons left. You’re lucky, Carolina, that you can get a new pistol before anyone notices your old one was missing.

In the end, the freelancer base is a smoking husk of what it once was. Fitting, you think. The freelancers agree with you. Well, the ones that are with you.

 

Say, where is freelancer team B?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know this one is really short! Forgive me, the last thing I wanted to do was just basically type out that scene from season ten. No need for it, I think.  
> All the same, I tried to have this carry the same kind of emotional weight without heavy text, and...yeah. Way too short. Ugh.


	43. Four Months

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, a confession. I...almost let this one die. Honestly, it kinda already did, as I left it alone for months on end again. The problem is that I'm losing my muse for this au, and with the way everything's been going, I just didn't have the time. Plus, rvb14 has been a super let-down, I've gotten addicted to other things that I would rather be writing fanfic for, and I didn't know exactly how I wanted to approach this final arc on this au.
> 
> All of that being said, I did not put almost two years of work into this piece not to give it my all and see it through to the end. Will I take a long time? Probably. I won't take another four months for a chapter, I promise, but the next one certainly won't be up by, say, tomorrow.  
> Just know that this is never going to end on a cliffhanger, this is going to get the epilogue it deserves, and I am going to put my best foot forward. (it will be my right foot, as the left foot is a fake one.)

“Okay, I’ll bite. How did you find us?”

“It was easy, actually. We just started listening for the sound of your whining and followed it all the way here.” Tucker throws in and immediately throws down, taking no bullshit.

After what you’ve all been through to get to this point, you don’t blame him.

Welcome back, Simmons. You’ll admit, it’s been a long and grueling journey to find and recover freelancer team B.

Hell, think back to four months ago. That might help make this moment feel so much better than it currently does.

Four months back leaves you lying on the ground in a puddle of your own blood, convinced that you will die clutching onto Donut. Four months leaves you a nervous wreck, as your eye is completely gone and everything is terrible. Losing half your vision makes what little vision you had beforehand go completely out of whack. You lose all depth perception. You get incredibly nervous when you hear something on the left of you. For the first month, you get accustomed to hugging the left wall whenever you walk around and keeping something physical on your side. Eventually, this habit is taken up by Grif, who is already at your side so much he may as well be a permanent fixture. When he first started doing it, you will admit, it almost made the problem worse, but now, it’s rather nice to know someone has your back-well, side.

But you’re getting ahead of yourself.

Four months ago leaves you without freelancer team B, consisting of Wash, North, South, and Maine; a smaller group than team A, but according to CT, this is not how the team is usually divided. Four months ago leaves you with Carolina getting oddly quiet about what went down in the facility, and giving no explanation for why the mission is suddenly abandoned and all the power in the base shut off.  
You don’t exactly feel it’s your place to ask, anyway.

Four months ago leaves you with the dramatic question; now what?

Three months ago, of course, left you with the answer: oh. You should’ve seen this coming.  
Back at the base (because let’s face it, the blues and reds were in no shape to go chasing after team B anytime soon) Jensen fiddled with the long-range radio. Palomo had bet her twelve gummy-bears (he wouldn’t say where he found the bag) that she could find a radio station that was still playing music.

She won the bet, but found something else entirely. A signal. A large signal calling out a name you’d heard before. Locus.

“Locus? I would’ve bet all my money on Felix being the one talked about.” Donut muttered to you and Grif as Jensen played the message back for Carolina for the eighth time.

“It’s got to be about Wash and the others.” Tucker said immediately, with no doubt in his mind.

“It’s too convenient and too soon. If it is about them, it’s obviously a trap.” Wyoming supplied with a nonchalant shrug.

It was a trap.

Two and a half months ago left you investigating a hideout that was so clean that it almost made you forget all about the apocalypse. Seriously, just walking near the area counteracted the way Grif always smelled. It stunk of chemical cleaner. Really cleaned out the sinuses.

After a little more investigation, you found out the reason for the cleaner. It was to counteract what Felix and Locus had left for you all.

The dead body of Washington.

Or at least, that’s what you all thought. The helmet had been glued on to the neck, the armor bolted onto the body, and wash’s gun laid haphazardly in its lap. It really scared the freelancers when you came back with it in tow. None of them seemed to want to touch it, the only person willing to pick it up and take it back to Dr. Grey being Sarge, who spent the entire 2-day trip back from the red team’s scouting mission keeping anyone else from so much as looking at it.

It was eventually revealed that no, it was not Wash. It was just some random guy who was about the same size as Wash. Dr. Grey suspected that you were meant to find this body much earlier on, seeing as the face of the rando once had something written on it. An address, probably. It was incredibly hard to read, and you hadn’t quite figured out how to manage it one-eyed.

One month ago left you with a set location: the town of Sidewinder. Apparently, it was Church’s hometown, and it was a distance. Literally. You had been casting out the net wide enough that some of you were gone for a week or longer just to investigate an area where there was rumored activity on the long-distance radio, but this would be a much longer journey than any of you expected or wanted.  
Sidewinder, Indiana. Home of the fucking nothing. Church adamantly professed against going all the way to Sidewinder, because that would be a fucking long road trip, and there was nothing interesting in Sidewinder anyway, there’s no way a guy like Felix would allow himself to stay in a town that boring. Please, god, begged Church, anything but Sidewinder.

A few weeks ago left you on the road to Sidewinder, all of you packed onto the school bus, which Lopez had for some reason added an outhouse to. A literal port-a-potty was bolted and stapled to the back of the bus, with the door facing in. Andersmith and Caboose had painted most of the outside of the bus in blue and green paint, giving it the most hodge-podge color scheme you’d ever seen on a vehicle. It took you all exactly three hours before you were all sick of being stuck together indefinitely, and by the time you actually made it to Sidewinder, Tex had broken eight people’s noses in actual fistfights. Kaikaina said it was the hottest thing she’d ever witnessed happening in a rear-view mirror, and she’d been a spectator for sex that way before. You chose to ignore that statement.

One week ago left you arriving in Sidewinder, wherein Church immediately stuck two fingers down his throat just so he could profusely vomit out the window as you passed the “Welcome to Sidewinder” sign. He missed the sign, but left an impressively disgusting line over an abandoned car. York somehow persuaded him to find his parent’s old house, but when Church finally caved and gave Doc (the driver at that moment in time) directions, the neighborhood was so full of zombies that there was no point in going that way, even for nostalgia. Church didn’t care at all. You set up camp at the local library. Three days ago left you all a little hungry, as Sidewinder was not densely populated and thus did not have much in terms of stores with food left. Grey suggested Freckles be on the menu. Caboose flipped out so hard that he brought zombies to the block, not enough to be a problem but enough to be an annoyance.

Yesterday left you with a direct message.  
“The Sidewinder post office. Tomorrow at noon. Come unarmed.” Came the voice through one of the walkie-talkies, left on by accident by Florida. It was so early in the morning you believed it was in a dream, but the communicator kept going off and saying it over and over again until finally someone woke up and realized it was not an annoying dream.

This morning left you all preparing for the worst of it. It wasn’t necessary. The worst of it ended up being Felix, moving some boxes of what appeared to be alcohol around in the back, behind the postal desk.

“What the-” he said when you all walked in, and on his face was a genuine look of shock and confusion, or at least a good fake-shock. “You know what, okay, okay, I’ll bite. How did you find us?”

“It was easy, actually. We just started listening for the sound of your whining and followed it all the way here.” Tucker throws in and immediately throws down, taking no bullshit.

After the four months of bullshit you’ve been through to get to this point, you don’t blame him.


End file.
